In response to my question below, TPM Reader JM writes:
I’m a long time federal criminal defense attorney in Chicago. In response to your question, there is no question that Stone’s lawyers need to prep him for the very real possibility that he will be locked up following the revocation hearing (show cause hearing) on Thursday.
The judge has the following options: 1) change nothing; 2) modify the conditions making them more restrictive; 3) revoke the bond and order Stone into custody but give him a surrender date; and 4) revoke bond and incarcerate him immediately.
Really, any of these outcomes could happen, and Stone’s lawyers need to let him know that.
My guess would be that options 2 and 4 are most likely. The judge is not bringing him back to scold him alone, I suspect. It also doesn’t seem likely that she is going to give him a surrender date if she locks him up. That is generally given so that defendants can clear up personal matters. Stone isn’t appearing until Thursday. He needs to start winding up now just in case he has to go in.
My guess is his lawyers have almost certainly spoken to him about this very real possibility. The fact that they filed the apology yesterday underscores how seriously they take the situation, and the extreme jeopardy in which they view Stone’s liberty right now.
A former federal prosecutor also chimed in:
You are probably getting a lot of messages from criminal defense lawyers about your show cause post. As a former AUSA, I will say that there is always a possibility that you will not come home. But much of that depends on the nature of the conditions already in place. In other words, if Jackson hasn’t imposed the most restrictive condition or combination of conditions already, then Stone’s criminal defense lawyer has wiggle room to ask for those conditions before detention is the only answer.
It also depends on whether the court thinks they can impose a condition or combination of conditions that can target Stone’s behavior short of needing to detain him. I think that what happened to Manafort is a good example: He showed repeated disregard for his pretrial supervision conditions, and once that happened the judge saw nothing more they could do other than detain him. Here, Stone’s inflammatory post might be better addressed via the gag order.
