Experts Say Hillary Clinton Is ‘Too Big To Jail’
Robert Gehl
November 2, 2015
The much-ballyhooed Benghazi hearing featuring Queen Hillary may be over, but the questions about her treatment of classified e-mails linger.
Lawyers who are familiar with classified information cases tell McClatchy News that the real question is whether Clinton and her staff failed to “sufficiently safeguard sensitive information.”
While there’s disagreement over whether there’s enough evidence to prosecute her, at least one said it doesn’t matter what the evidence reveals.
“She’s too big to jail,” said national security attorney Edward MacMahon Jr., who represented former CIA employee Jeffrey Sterling in 2011 in a leak case that led to an espionage prosecution and 3½-year prison term. He cited a pattern of light punishments for top government officials who have mishandled classified information while lower level whistleblowers such as Sterling have faced harsh prosecutions for revealing sensitive information to expose waste, fraud or abuse in government.
So far, there have been 671 classified e-mails sent or received through Clinton’s private server, according to the State Department’s latest update. They are combing through the more than 30,000 e-mails and release regular updates, by court order. This last tally was 7,200 e-mails.
Most of the classified emails are at the “confidential” level – the lowest level of classification – but if additional emails are determined to be the more sensitive “secret” or highly sensitive “top secret” levels, it would raise the gravity of a potential security breach.
If Clinton aides pasted classified information into emails to her without including markings signaling the material was classified they could face felony charges.
Clinton’s campaign declined to comment for this story. Clinton initially said she did not send or receive any classified information – a denial she later adjusted, saying that none was marked as classified at the time.
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