Alexander Smirnov, the previous F.B.I. informant charged with falsely claiming that President Biden and his son Hunter had accepted bribes, might be held in custody indefinitely as a result of he poses a major flight danger, a decide in California dominated on Monday.
After a 45-minute listening to, a bespectacled Mr. Smirnov — stocky, bearded with close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair and sporting tan and orange jail togs — pleaded not responsible in closely accented English, turning round briefly to wave at his longtime girlfriend seated within the gallery.
Choose Otis D. Wright II of Federal District Court docket discovered fault with a choice by a federal Justice of the Peace in Las Vegas who final week launched Mr. Smirnov, 43, a confidential informant since 2010, and dismissed the argument by prosecutors that he would attempt to escape to Russia.
Prosecutors working for David C. Weiss, the particular counsel investigating Hunter Biden, supplied new particulars in regards to the circumstances of Mr. Smirnov’s rearrest final week within the workplace of his lawyer. They grew alarmed after a search of the $980,000 rental owned by Mr. Smirnov’s girlfriend and the place he has lived for the previous two years revealed 9 handguns, they mentioned.
A prosecutor for Mr. Weiss, Leo Sensible, defined that the sheer variety of weapons prompted Justice Division officers to make an arrest on the legislation workplace, quite than Mr. Smirnov’s house, which they believed wouldn’t be secure. They have been in a position to observe his actions due to an ankle monitor.
Mr. Smirnov’s lawyer, David Chesnoff, defined that Mr. Smirnov was at his workplace on the time of his rearrest as a result of he was keen to start getting ready his protection. He mentioned he deliberate to attraction the choice.
Requested outdoors the courthouse whether or not his workforce had in actual fact sought to assist its consumer flee the nation as prosecutors have prompt, Mr. Chesnoff appeared to sidestep the query.
“I feel that’s a useless problem,” he mentioned, including, “I don’t suppose there’s any controversy.”
Choose Wright additionally expressed concern about Mr. Smirnov’s funds. Prosecutors had accused Mr. Smirnov, a twin U.S.-Israeli citizen, of deliberately underestimating his private wealth of $6 million and located a latest flood of outflows from his accounts, lots of of 1000’s of {dollars} a 12 months, to be suspicious.
“There’s nothing backyard selection about this case,” Choose Wright mentioned.
Mr. Chesnoff argued that his consumer was a loyal American who wouldn’t flee the nation. He complained that Mr. Smirnov was being handled extra harshly than the disgraced financier Bernie Madoff, who had been allowed to go free pending trial after he agreed to put on an ankle monitor.
Mr. Madoff “ripped off all of America and half of Europe,” he mentioned.
Mr. Smirnov was escorted out of the courtroom and positioned into protecting custody, aside from the overall inhabitants of the federal lockup in Los Angeles.
On Friday, Mr. Smirnov was transported to California by U.S. marshals partially as a result of the case had been introduced in federal court docket within the state.
Mr. Smirnov was arrested on Feb. 15 as he disembarked from a global flight in Las Vegas, the place he has lived for the previous two years together with his girlfriend.
In 2020, Mr. Smirnov advised his F.B.I. handler what prosecutors say was a brazen lie: that the oligarch proprietor of the Ukrainian vitality firm Burisma had organized to pay $5 million in bribes to each Hunter Biden and his father. The explosive declare was leaked to Republicans, who made it public apparently with out verifying it.
On the time of his arrest, Mr. Smirnov was planning to depart for what prosecutors known as “a monthslong, multicountry overseas journey” throughout which he claimed to have plans to fulfill with contacts from a number of overseas intelligence businesses.
For greater than a decade, Mr. Smirnov, who speaks English and Russian, gave the F.B.I. visibility into the shadowy world of oligarchs and public officers whereas providing himself as a guide to among the similar individuals he was monitoring.
In court docket filings, the particular counsel described Mr. Smirnov as a serial liar who couldn’t even be trusted to truthfully describe his occupation or account for his funds.
