Mueller team moves another case toward sentencing
By JOSH GERSTEIN 05/29/2018 04:18 PM EDT
Special counsel Robert Mueller's prosecutors indicated Tuesday that they're ready to move toward sentencing of another defendant who pleaded guilty in the ongoing probe of Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election.
Prosecutors asked a federal judge to order a pre-sentencing report for Richard Pinedo, a Santa Paula, California, man who admitted in February to a felony identity fraud charge relating to the sale of bank account numbers that apparently helped Russian internet trolls pay for social media ads related to the U.S. presidential race.
Mueller's team and Pinedo's attorneys have said he did not know who he was dealing with when he sold the bank account numbers. A statement of facts Pinedo accepted as part of his plea said that he knew many of his customers were abroad and that he “willfully and intentionally avoided learning” about the stolen identities.
The joint request for the probation-office report on Pinedo's background and his crime suggests that his case could move to sentencing in the next two or three months.
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https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/29/mueller-russia-probe-sentencing-richard-pinedo-610843
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