From: Thomas Lambert Cranmer
221 Donmore Dr
Great Falls, VA 22066-1102
Tel 703-450-6576, Cell 703-447-4494
ThomasCranmer221@gmail.com
June 7, 2016
To: James B. Comey, Director
Federal Bureau of Investigation
935 Pennsylvania Ave
Washington, DC 20535-0001
Dear Director Comey:
The FBI's recent radio ads requested public assistance in identifying public corruption. This amicus letter is in response to your request, based on my experience as a State Department employee with a top secret clearance and work in corrupt countries from Albania to Zimbabwe for decades.
As a loyal citizen, deeply concerned with the future of our country and that of my family, I have watched the steady decline of integrity within the U.S. with great alarm. Using publicly available sources, I have written in this letter a detailed analysis of what I believe to be one of the most astounding corruption cases ever, involving a politician who wishes to lead my beloved country. I have read that you and a large number of your agents are carrying out a criminal investigation of these cases.
I am sending you my analysis in the hope that you will see more support for your efforts. Public statements make me concerned that federal government officials and journalists do not understand that serious laws were broken, not just a bunch of silly rules.
If you and/or the Department of Justice (DOJ) do not proceed with an indictment and trial of the Clintons and their corrupt enterprise, it will encourage more corruption and disclosure of more classified information, further endangering the U.S. We hope the FBI and DOJ would show that senior, politically powerful, famous people will be indicted when laws are broken, just as are ordinary citizens.
The U.S. is regarded as one of the most corrupt countries:
The poor reputation of the U.S. is disturbing: The Rasmussen Report
on a February 3, 2016 survey of 1,000 likely voters showed 81% "strongly
believe the federal government is crooked." Gallup reported on September
19, 2015 in a survey of 1,000 adults, 75% "perceived corruption as widespread
in the country's government." In 2007, 67% responded the same way.
Freedom House listed the U.S. as being perceived by 75% of respondents as one of the most corrupt countries of the world. Only 12 countries of the world were regarded as worse. Almost all of the 24 countries in the world regarded as less corrupt were developed countries, including Sweden at 14% of respondents.
Transparency International (TI) says on their web site 72% of people surveyed believe the U.S. government's efforts to fight corruption are ineffective. Other TI ratings for the U.S. are:
I hope the DOJ and you would not increase the already bad corruption reputation of the U.S. by allowing political pressure to cover up and obfuscate the facts of your investigations.
Sources for Comments
Most of my comments are not original. Many experts have done an excellent
job of describing many of the violations of laws, including, but not limited
to: Judge and former AG Michael Mukasey, Joseph E. diGenova, Judge Andrew
Napolitano, Sharyl Attkisson, Catherine Herridge, Pamela Browne, Mayor Rudy
Giuliani, Rep. Darrell Issa, Tom Fitton, Larry Klayman and Peter Schweizer.
In addition, the State Department's Office of the Inspector General provided valuable support for my comments on Clinton corruption. It is suspicious that no Inspector General was appointed to the State Department for most, if not all, of Hillary Clinton's time at State.
The Clinton Crime Syndicate has been protected by
many people.
Hillary and Bill Clinton, their lawyer, David Kendall, their aides Huma
Abedin, Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills, and Jake Sullivan appear to have
committed major illegal acts including inter alia bribery,
racketeering, and handling over 2,100 classified documents in an unsecured
environment, violating multiple sections of the Espionage Act. Numerous
State employees, especially Patrick Kennedy, Daniel Smith and Lewis Lukens
approved or ignored Hillary Clinton's and her staff's use of unsecured
computers, cell phones and e-mails at State. The Clintons and Clinton
Foundation employees have contributed to increased public mistrust,
blatantly flouting U.S. laws by accepting apparently illegal donations
(bribes) and not reporting them.
The Office of Inspector General (OIG), U.S. Department of State (State) did a comprehensive "Evaluation of Email Records Management and Cybersecurity Requirements" dated May 2016. Secretary Clinton and her aides have added to the mistrust recently by refusing to answer questions about her email system and retention / destruction of records relating to her tenure as Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013.
Declining OIG's requests for interviews (OIG, pp 2&5) were:
I hope you subpoena all of these individuals for interviews, since they will not voluntarily testify to the OIG, and subpoena all of their relevant records. These are the people who potentially should be charged with the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), Public Law 91-452, 18 U.S.C. -- violations and conspiracy to subvert the law and justice.
Violations of the Espionage act regarding Clinton's e-mails are the focus of many people. The focus also should be RICO's broad definition of 35 crimes and includes the activities of the Clintons and their associates. Penalties can be a fine of $25,000 and 20 years in prison for each racketeering count.
The OIG noted "A March 17, 2009 memorandum prepared by S/ES-IR staff regarding communications equipment in the Secretary's New York residence identified a server located in the basement." She used personal email "predominately through mobile devices." (OIG p. 3) This server and the mobile devices containing classified email records were unsecured, a violation of the Espionage Act and State policy rules. The OIG reported on p. 23: "Former Secretary Clinton did not use a Department email account and has acknowledged using an email account maintained on a private server for official business."
The OIG commented further on p. 23:
"...sending emails from a personal account to other employees at their Department accounts is not an appropriate method of preserving any such emails that would constitute a Federal record. Therefore, Secretary Clinton should have preserved any Federal records she created and received on her personal account by printing and filing those records with the related files in the Office of the Secretary. At a minimum, Secretary Clinton should have surrendered all emails dealing with Department business before leaving government service, and, because she did not do so, she did not comply with the Department's policies that were implemented in accordance with the Federal Records Act.”
The OIG added on p. 23:
"Secretary Clinton's production was incomplete. For example, the Department and OIG both determined that the production included no email covering the first few months of Secretary Clinton's tenure... OIG discovered multiple instances in which Secretary Clinton's personal email account sent and received official business email during this period. For instance, the Department of Defense (DOD) provided to OIG in September 2015 copies of 19 emails between Secretary Clinton and General David Petraeus on his official DOD email account; these 19 emails were not in the Secretary's 55,000-page production."
The OIG reported on p. 27:
"The Department's current policy, implemented in 2005, is that normal day-to-day operations should be conducted on an authorized Automated Information System (AIS), which 'has the proper level of security control to...ensure confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the resident information... Among these are requirements for certifying and accrediting information systems, retaining system audit records for monitoring purposes, conducting risk assessments, and ensuring the protection of communications."
Hillary Clinton and her staff utterly failed in meeting any of these requirements, especially protection of communications. This endangered the people of the U.S.
By court order, Judicial Watch deposed Lewis A. Lukens on May 18, 2016 in the Justice Department offices. He was manager of logistics at State for the Secretary, with 110 people reporting to him. Lukens testified that although a he had a security officer in his department, nobody questioned Secretary Clinton about her e-mail use, although she did not have a secure means of communicating. It was forbidden to use a wireless computer communication system in her office area, but Lukens saw her using a Blackberry in the hallways and in foreign areas. This potentially exposed classified data to our enemies, who routinely hack government sites daily. He testified that he did not believe State set up a State e-mail address for Mrs. Clinton. Lukens wrote in an e-mail that Cheryl Mills "says the problem is HRC [Hillary Rodham Clinton] does not know how to use a computer to do e-mail, only BB [Blackberry]." If Clinton knew how to use a BB to send e-mail, why couldn't she use a desktop? What difference is there? State set up my e-mail address easily and it was simple to maintain.
The OIG reported on p. 29 that State's Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM) in 2009 "prohibits use of person digital assistants (PDAs) in Department facilities, except for strictly unclassified areas." An example the OIG cited as an unclassified area is the cafeteria. PDAs "could not connect with a Department network except via a Department-approved remote-access program, such as Global OpenNet." (OIG, p. 30) Clinton did not have any approvals for her Blackberry (OIG, p. 36) or use of Global OpenNet.
The Assistant Secretary of Diplomatic Security (DS) "...sent a classified memorandum to Secretary Clinton's Chief of Staff that described the vulnerabilities associated with the use of Blackberry devices and also noted the prohibition on the use of Blackberry devices in sensitive areas. According to a DS official, "Secretary Clinton approached the Assistant Secretary and told him she 'gets it'." (OIG, p. 33)
On June 28, 2011, the Department sent a cable stating that "recently, Google asserted that online adversaries are targeting the personal Gmail accounts of U.S. government employees." The cable recommended Department users and their family members "avoid conducting official Department business from your personal e-mail accounts." (OIG, p. 34)
The U.S. government Office of Personnel Management (OPM) notified me my State Department records were hacked and probably copied. OPM offered to pay for my personal accounts to be monitored by a security service. Over 20 million U.S. government employees and former employees had this experience. Hacking of many other government departments, including DOD, has been reported extensively in the press.
Hacking of corporate data is widespread. The Ponemon Institute Research Report published in January 2015 said: "Forty-five percent of respondents report their company had one or more data breaches in the past 24 months." (p. 8). The Business Institute reported on October 6, 2014 that you said: "There are two kinds of big companies in the U.S. There are those who've been hacked ... and there are those who don't know they've been hacked."
Even individuals I know, who are not famous, have been hacked. My Yahoo account and my wife's were hacked separately by people who sent out bogus emails. The hackers eliminated most of 15 years of my personal emails and many of my contacts. We reported this to Yahoo security people and arranged for our email addresses and the accounts to be eliminated.
Hacking of Clinton's email was reported on January 9, 2011 to the Secretary's Deputy Chief of Operations. Clinton's server was shut down. Contrary to Department regulations and common sense, no report went "to computer security personnel or anyone else within the Department" (OIG, p. 40). I hope your forensic computer experts can identify how many times Clinton's unsecured email system was hacked and by whom.
On May 23, 2016 Julian Hattem of The Hill wrote that Marcel Lehel Lazar, aka "Guccifer", who had "access to longtime Clinton ally Sidney Blumenthal's email account, first exposed Clinton s use of a private email account during her time in office." Lazar has been indicted on nine felony counts related to his hacking into accounts of senior U.S. officials, and plans to plead guilty. Lazar, a Romanian, claims he broke into Clinton's unsecured personal email server. Why hasn't Clinton been indicted for any of the counts cited in this letter?
State intimidated employees from reporting Clinton's violations of law and State rules. The Director of Clinton's staff group stated their mission "is to support the Secretary and instructed the staff never to speak of the Secretary's personal email system again." (OIG, p. 40)
Secretary Clinton has said that others did what she did. The OIG report makes it clear no other Secretary of State used their own server or transmitted or stored classified information in an unclassified environment. Departmental regulations stated that a stand-alone information network, such as a local network or server "were not to be used to carry out Department business or to transmit sensitive but unclassified (SBU) information." (5 FAM 874.2 of May 4, 2004)
Only two others used non-Departmental email systems (not servers) on an exclusive basis for day-to-day operations: Colin Power and Scott Gration. Gration, an ambassador to Kenya, resigned when the Department was considering disciplinary proceedings against him for use of unclassified e-mail systems. (OIG, p. 41)
A violation of a law is still a violation, and what others may have done is not an acceptable legal defense. Being caught driving at 80 miles an hour in a 55-miles-an-hour zone is not excusable by saying others were driving at 80 miles an hour also.
It was considered illegal for me to take an unapproved computer, cell phone or thumb drive into State and/or an embassy, even though I had a top secret clearance. Sensitive information by its nature is classified, even if I or someone else do not write the words "confidential, secret, top secret" and similar designations on a document with classified information. Anyone removing those designations on a document does not declassify the information. Intent is immaterial, the act of mishandling documents is a violation of laws.
Laws Violated
Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, Esq. of Giuliani Partners LLC summarized the
following laws violated, according to Sean Hannity on November 13, 2015:
The Espionage Act specifies a ten-year jail term for grossly negligent loss or destruction of information relating to national defense, especially in impeding an investigation. The Clintons' illegal acts and the lack of prosecution encourage government employees to take bribes, disregard secrecy laws and endanger the security of the U.S. and individual citizens.
The Federal Records Act of 1950 requires "The head of each Federal agency shall make and preserve records containing adequate and proper documentation of the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, and essential transactions of the agency and designed to furnish the information necessary to protect the legal and financial rights of the Government and of persons directly affected by the agency's activities." (44 U.S.C. Chapter 31, Section 3101). Clinton was the head of State and violated The Federal Records Act.
There are criminal penalties for the unlawful removal or destruction of Federal records (18 U.S.C. 2071 and 36 CFR 1228.102) and the unlawful disclosure of national security information (18 U.S.C. 793, 794, and 798). Secretary Clinton did not preserve records as required under the law and State rules. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in a December 2004 bulletin stated that when officials intermingle their personal and official files they all should be available for review. Secretary Clinton said she deleted roughly 30,000 of her personal files and did not submit them for review, which appears to be a criminal act, possibly for each record deletion.
In 2009 the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) added "Agencies that allow employees to send and receive official electronic mail messages using a system not operated by the agency must ensure that Federal records sent or received on such systems are preserved in the appropriate agency recordkeeping system." (OIG p. 5) None of Hillary's records were preserved in State's record keeping system until two years after she left State and was compelled to surrender copies; but she surrendered only paper copies of only records she deemed official business.
The Foreign Affairs Handbook (FAH) specifies that "departing officials who wish to remove any documents (emphasis added) must prepare an inventory of these personal papers and any non-record materials for review by Department officials." (OIG p. 17) No inventory was prepared, apparently.
Over ten thousand individual legal criminal counts appear applicable, so the grand jury's review would take a long time. This relates not only for multiple violations for the handling of each of over 2,100 classified e-mails, but also for the counts of bribery, racketeering, perjury, lying to law enforcement officials, violations of the Federal Records Act, conspiracy, and obstruction of justice. The Freedom of Information Act was clearly violated. Most people and journalists forget that Bill Clinton already has been convicted of perjury and had his law license revoked, and participated with Hillary Clinton in multiple illegal events.
Proof of intent to violate the laws is not a requirement for prosecution. Claiming ignorance of laws is also not an acceptable defense. The violations should be prima facie evidence sufficient to obtain indictments.
Journalists and even most politicians seem too stupid and lazy to look at the wording of applicable laws, since they don't cite or quote the laws. U.S. Code Title 18 defines (a) Classified information "any information or material that has been determined by the United States Government pursuant to an Executive order, statute, or regulation, to require protection against unauthorized disclosure for reasons of national security and any restricted data..." and (b) National security "means the national defense and foreign relations of the United States" (emphasis added).
The Espionage Act 18 U.S. Code section 793 for example is very clear as it applies to Hillary Clinton:
It is clear at least 2,100 classified documents illegally in her possession for over two years and the balance of unclassified emails were not produced as required by the Freedom of Information Act. Clinton said she turned over her documents on a thumb drive to her lawyers. Her lawyers were not authorized to receive the documents. Clinton also destroyed half of the documents in her possession, roughly 30,000 that were co-mingled with documents she deemed official. All of the documents should have been turned over to State. She claimed the classified documents were not marked classified, but it is clear they were "abstracted" within the meaning of the Espionage Act.
Bribery
It is essential to subpoena internal records of U.S. and foreign corporations
on why they agreed to give large speaking fees totaling about $115 million
to the Clintons and "donations" to the Clinton Foundation and affiliates.
Corporations document who approved these gifts and why.
It appears many of Bill and Hillary's actions violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, as amended, 15 U.S.C. §§ 78dd-1, et seq. ("FCPA"). This involves:
"authorization of the payment of money or anything of value to any person, while knowing that all or a portion of such money or thing of value will be offered, given or promised, directly or indirectly, to a foreign official to influence the foreign official in his or her official capacity, induce the foreign official to do or omit to do an act... to secure any improper advantage in order to assist in obtaining or retaining business for or with, or directing business to, any person." With the enactment of certain amendments in 1998, the anti-bribery provisions of the FCPA now also apply to foreign firms and persons "who cause, directly or through agents, an act in furtherance of such a corrupt payment to take place within the territory of the United States.” (DOJ Overview of the FCPA)
In addition, bribery of any sort is a crime:
Section 201 of Title 18 is entitled "Bribery of public officials and witnesses." The statute comprises two distinct offenses, however, and in common parlance only the first of these is true "bribery". The first offense, codified in section 201(b), prohibits the giving or accepting of anything of value to or by a public official, if the thing is given "with intent to influence" an official act, or if it is received by the official "in return for being influenced." The second offense, codified in section 201(c), concerns what are commonly known as "gratuities", although that word does not appear anywhere in the statute. Section 201(c) prohibits that same public official from accepting the same thing of value, if he does so "for or because of" any official act, and prohibits anyone from giving any such thing to him for such a reason.” (U.S. Attorneys' Manual, Criminal Resource Manual 2000-2500)
The gratuities are large speaking fees given Bill and Hillary Clinton and payments to the Clinton Foundation, the Clinton Global Initiative and other affiliates by foreign governments, foreign individuals, multi-national organizations and banks, public charities and public universities, in return for access and favors.
The criminal penalties differ between a bribe and a gratuity:
"A §201(b) "bribe" conviction is punishable by up to 15 years in prison, while a §201(c) "gratuity" conviction permits only a maximum 2-year sentence. In addition, with a "bribe", the payment may go to anyone or to anything and may include campaign contributions, while with a "gratuity", the payment must inure to the personal benefit of the public official and cannot include campaign contributions.” (Ibid)
The Clinton Foundation web site presents one page of financial statements, but it does not disclose who did the audit or presentation details required for audits by American Institute of Certified Public Accountants for non-profits. I am familiar with these requirements, because I was the V.P. for finance of the 501(c)(3) Student Conservation Association.
According to an analysis on 27 April 2015 by Sean Davis of the Federalist Society, based on IRS form 990 filings: "Between 2011 and 2013, the organization spent only 9.9 percent of the $252 million it collected on direct charitable grants." "The Clinton Foundation announced last week that it would be refiling its tax returns for the last five years because it had improperly failed to disclose millions of dollars in donations from foreign sources while Hillary Clinton was serving as Secretary of State."
The book Clinton Cash provides more comprehensive documentation of bribes accepted by and given by the Clintons. However, the following is one matter in which I have some expertise.
Bribery to give the Russians 20% of U.S. uranium.
One of the most blatant incidents of bribery to the Clintons is the sale of
about 20% of U.S. uranium output to the Russians through Uranium One. See
Schweizer, Clinton Cash, p. 41. He provides excellent details in his
book, of the sordid sell-out of U.S. uranium. The Russians' speaking fee of
$500,000 to Bill Clinton and millions of dollars of contributions to the
Clinton Foundation and Canadian affiliate are beyond all reason and
precedent. Clearly the Russian, Kazakhstan, and U.S. governments, Frank
Giustra and the Clintons conspired through bribery illegally to turn over
the Wyoming property and other uranium properties ultimately to the Russians
and to export uranium ore (carnotite) illegally out of the U.S.
"Giustra gave the Clinton Foundation $31.3 million" (Schweizer, p. 31). In addition, "Giustra announced a multiyear commitment to donate $100 million, and half of his future profits, to the Clinton Foundation..." (ibid, p. 34). "The collective commitments and donations from investors who profited from the deal would ultimately exceed $145 million." (ibid, p. 35)
Years ago I staked some claims on the 293,000 acres on the Uranium One Wyoming property. My work in Wyoming as a geologist with others led to the conviction and imprisonment of at least two Atomic Energy Commission employees. They falsified data to be able to buy nearby properties at a deeply discounted price.
I dealt with Russia and Russian companies for many years and complained to State about money laundering through Cyprus to no avail. I was very familiar, but not directly involved, with the Kazakhstan corruption and tyranny situation while I was with Mobil Oil, when an employee was arrested for bribery of Kazakh officials.
Judicial Watch filed on October 21, 2015 a FOIA lawsuit seeking information on the Uranium One deal "seeking communications between the U.S. Department of the Treasury and Hillary Clinton." It was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (No. 1:15-cv-01776). It appears the Committee on Foreign Investments (CFIUS) was not informed of the fees and donations the Clintons and their foundations received, and approved the deal in 52 days, instead of the required 72-day review and approval period. I also filed a FOIA request for information relating to this uranium deal with CFIUS.
State conflict of interest rules and security laws
As a State employee, I would have been punished if I even accepted a lunch
from someone with a financial interest in what I was doing. The punishment
would have been severe if I even wrote by hand on pad a paragraph from a
classified document, then left the pad with an impression of the paragraph
in an unsecured environment, even though the original handwriting on the top
sheet was properly put in a safe or destroyed. The writing on the sheet
would not have needed to have any words such as confidential, secret,
or top secret.
The word "classified" alone on a document has no meaning, contrary to Hillary Clinton's statements that none of the documents used the word "classified". The words "confidential, secret, and top secret" are used to indicate the classification of a document. If someone on Hillary Clinton's staff wanted to copy parts of a secure document, it would have been easy to type or scan excerpts and illegally distribute them unsecured without the appropriate secrecy designation. Such copying would not have changed the secrecy rating, but would have been illegal.
State Department lies about unsecured e-mails
When State officials lied to Federal Judge Rudolph Contreras about not
having copies of e-mails from Hillary Clinton and her aides, it was perjury
and lying to public officials. The e-mails that have finally been made
public show that many State employees received e-mails from Hillary Clinton,
including her staff using the address "clintonemail.com" as well as other
addresses. State apparently made no effort to have employees search for
any e-mails sent from clintonemail.com,
Apparent bribery through the Clinton Foundation et al
Judicial Watch reported one of their:
"...lawsuits in which the Clinton email system is at issue, forced the disclosure last year of documents that provided a road map for over 200 conflict-of-interest rulings that led to $48 million for the Clinton Foundation and other Clinton-connected entities during Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state. Previously disclosed documents in this lawsuit, for example, raise questions about funds Clinton accepted from entities linked to Saudi Arabia, China and Iran, among others."
My remarks above were made based on my experience in evaluating legal issues, corruption, proposing and negotiating solutions. Although I am not a lawyer, I studied law at Yale, Columbia and New York University. I worked as an international planner and a treasurer in Mobil Oil Corporation, a manager in the State Department (Top Secret clearance) and an international consultant. I am a fellow at the American Center for Democracy.
You have the reputation of being honest, competent and diligent. I hope soon you refer recommendations and backup research for criminal prosecution of the Clintons and their staffs to the Justice Department. If the Justice Department refuses to impanel a grand jury or to prosecute, I hope you and many FBI agents resign in protest. The security of the U.S. is at stake.
If the Clintons are not prosecuted, senior officials with strong political connections would feel freer to accept bribes and leak classified defense information about our vulnerabilities that could lead to war and the destruction of the U.S.
I recommend you finish your investigation soon and request the Justice Department to convene a grand jury to approve subpoenas and indictments. It would ameliorate the decline in the public's respect for the rule of law.
Thank you for considering my comments.
Copies to:Respectfully,
[Signed]
Thomas Lambert Cranmer
American Center for Democracy
Fairfax County Free Citizen
Fairfax County Taxpayer’s Alliance
Rep. Barbara Comstock
Rep. Darrell Issa
Speaker Paul Ryan
Senator Tim Kaine
Senator Mark Warner
Mayor Rudolf Giuliani, Esq.
Joseph diGenova, Esq.
Tom Fitton
Judge Michael Mukasey
Judge Andrew Napolitano
Sharyl Attkisson
Catherine Herridge
Larry Klayman
Peter Schweizer.