Judge orders Justice Department to return data used to indict James Comey

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Justice Department to return data it seized in 2017 from a close friend of former FBI Director James Comey, concluding that the agency violated his constitutional rights.

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Justice Department to return data it seized in 2017 from a close friend of former FBI Director James Comey’s, concluding that the agency violated the constitutional rights of law professor Daniel Richman and had improperly used the material to indict Comey.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly heavily criticized Justice Department prosecutors, ruling that the data and material, an image of Richman’s hard drive along with emails from his iCloud and Columbia University email accounts, was handled with “callous disregard” for Richman’s rights.

The order is another blow to the Justice Department and prosecutors from the Eastern District of Virginia, after U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie ruled last month that former Trump attorney Lindsey Halligan was not lawfully appointed as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia when she single-handedly presented the Comey case to a grand jury.

The Justice Department didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday in response to the ruling, or on whether it will seek new indictments against Comey.

Earlier this week, prosecutors filed a motion in the case arguing that they needed the information to seek a new indictment against Comey after an initial indictment was dismissed last month due to the ruling on Halligan’s appointment.