Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
A former FBI informant who prosecutors say fabricated a false story about President Biden and his son Hunter Biden accepting $10 million in bribes from Ukrainian gas company Burisma was sentenced Wednesday to six years in federal prison.
Alexander Smirnov, a dual American and Israeli citizen, has been behind bars since he was arrested last February on charges of making false statements to the FBI.
The indictment was related to special counsel David Weiss’ investigation into Hunter Biden. Weiss later charged Hunter with taxes and gun-related charges, but President Biden granted him a blanket pardon in December before his son was sentenced.
The Justice Department filed additional tax charges against Smirnov in November, alleging that he hid millions of dollars in income he earned between 2020 and 2022, and Smirnov. pleaded guilty in December to avoid his impending judgment.
BIDEN SAYS ‘I MEANT WHAT I SAID’ AS HE PROMISES NOT TO PARDON HUNTER, HOPE HE CAN’T SET A PRECEDENT
In this courtroom sketch, defendant Alexander Smirnov speaks in federal court in Los Angeles, Feb. 26, 2024. (William T. Robles via AP, File)
Smirnov was accused of falsely telling his FBI handler that executives at the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had paid then-Vice President Biden and his son $5 million each around 2015. Smirnov’s explosive claim in 2020 came after he expressed a “bias” about Joe Biden as a presidential candidate, according to prosecutors. The indictment says investigators found Smirnov had only routine business dealings with Burisma beginning in 2017, after Biden’s term as vice president.
Prosecutors noted that Smirnov’s claim “set off a firestorm in Congress” when it resurfaced years later as part of the House impeachment inquiry into President Biden. The Biden administration dismissed the House impeachment effort as a “trick.”
Former FBI informant Alexander Smirnov, left, leaves his attorney’s office in downtown Las Vegas after being released from federal custody on Feb. 20, 2024. (KM Cannon/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP, File)
SPECIAL COUNSEL WEISS TELLS LAWMAKERS POLITICS ‘DID NOT PLAY A PART’ IN HUNTER BIDEN PROBE
Before Smirnov’s arrest, Republicans had asked the FBI released the unredacted form documenting the unverified allegations, though they acknowledged they could not confirm whether they were true.
“In committing his crimes he betrayed the United States, a country that has shown him nothing but generosity, including bestowing upon him the highest honor it can bestow, citizenship,” Weiss’ team wrote in documents judicial “He repaid the trust that the United States placed in him to be a law-abiding naturalized citizen and, more specifically, that one of its top law enforcement agencies placed in him to tell the truth as confidential human source, trying to interfere in a presidential election.”
President Joe Biden, wearing a Team USA jacket and walking with his son Hunter Biden, heads toward Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, July 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, file)
Prosecutors agreed to pursue no more than six years against Smirnov as part of their plea deal. In court documents, the Justice Department described Smirnov as a “liar and tax cheat” who “betrayed the United States,” adding that his false corruption claims against the Biden family were “among the types of “the most serious electoral interference imaginable”. ”
In seeking a lighter sentence, Smirnov’s lawyers wrote that both Hunter Biden and President-elect Trump, who was charged in two federal cases since dropped by special counsel Jack Smith, “have been free and clear of any punishment significant”.
His lawyers had asked for a four-year prison sentence, arguing that their client “has learned a very serious lesson”, had no criminal record and suffered from severe glaucoma in both eyes. Smirnov’s sentencing Wednesday in federal court in Los Angeles concluded the final aspects of the Weiss investigation, and the special counsel is expected to submit a report to Attorney General Merrick Garland in accordance with federal regulations. Garland can decide whether to release it to the public.
Smirnov will receive credit for time served behind bars since February.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
