April 29 \u2013 Former FBI Director James Comey has been charged with threateningthe life of US President Donald Trump, a formal accusation that stems from an imagehebriefly shared on social media.<\/p>\n
The image posted on Instagram last year showed seashells forming the numbers \u201c86 47\u201d. \u201cEighty-six\u201d is a slang term used to mean \u201ceject\u201d or \u201cremove\u201d.<\/p>\n
Comey has insisted he did not know what the numbers on the image meant, but Trump and other administration officials have said the post was a threat against the 47th president.<\/p>\n
Responding to the charges on Tuesday, Comey said: \u201cI\u2019m still innocent, I\u2019m still not afraid, and I still believe in the independent federal judiciary.\u201d<\/p>\n
At a press conference to announce the indictment, FBI Director Kash Patel said that as the former director of the agency, Comey \u201cknew full well the attention and consequences of making such a post\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cJames Comey disgracefully encouraged a threat on President Trump\u2019s life and posted it on Instagram for the world to see,\u201d Kash Patel said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Comey was fired by Trump during his first term, after the former FBI director opened an investigation into Russian interference in the US 2016 presidential election.<\/p>\n
Since then, Trump has repeatedly called for his prosecution \u2013 Tuesday\u2019s charges are the administration\u2019s second attempt to do so.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, they\u2019re back. This time about a picture of sea shells on a North Carolina beach a year ago. And this won\u2019t be the end of it, but nothing has changed with me,\u201d Comey said in a statement.<\/p>\n
Comey faces charges of making a threat against the president and transmitting a threat in interstate commerce, according to court documents. Each charge carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.<\/p>\n
The criminal charges were filed in the Eastern District of North Carolina, the same region where the shells were reportedly found.<\/p>\n
\u201cThreatening the life of the President of the United States is a grave violation of our nation\u2019s laws,\u201d Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement. \u201cThe grand jury returned an indictment alleging James Comey did just that.\u201d<\/p>\n
US Secret Service agents interviewed Comey last May about the seashell photo.<\/p>\n
Comey deleted the Instagram post, saying in a follow-up that he \u201cassumed [the sea shells] were a political message\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t realise some folks associate those numbers with violence,\u201d he added. \u201cIt never occurred to me but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump, who has long criticised Comey, said of the post that \u201ca child knows what that meant\u201d.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
April 29 \u2013 Former FBI Director James Comey has been charged with threateningthe life of US President Donald Trump, a formal accusation that stems from an imagehebriefly shared on social media. The image posted on Instagram last year showed seashells forming the numbers \u201c86 47\u201d. \u201cEighty-six\u201d is a slang term used to mean \u201ceject\u201d or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139285\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}