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A former FBI informant accused of falsely claiming that President Biden and his son Hunter took bribes has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges, according to court documents filed Thursday.
As part of his plea deal with Justice Department Special Counsel David Weiss, California resident Alexander Smirnov will admit to fabricating the story that is at the center of the Republican impeachment inquiry in Congress.
The plea deal comes just weeks after prosecutors filed new tax evasion charges against Smirnov. According to the agreement, both sides will recommend a prison sentence of at least two years but no more than six years.
Mr. Smirnov’s lawyer did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment Thursday.
Smirnov is accused of falsely reporting to the FBI in June 2020 that executives associated with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had paid $5 million each to Hunter Biden and Joe Biden in 2015 or 2016. He was arrested in February. According to court documents, Hunter Biden was hired “to protect us through my father from all kinds of problems.”
Prosecutors said Mr. Smirnov had contact with Burisma executives on a daily basis, but in 2017, after President Obama and Vice President Biden left office, Mr. He would have had no ability to influence U.S. policy. Prosecutors announced the bribery charges after he “expressed bias” against Biden when he was a presidential candidate.
Prosecutors said when he was questioned by FBI agents in September 2023, he repeated some of the false claims, changed his story about others and said he had “met with Russian officials.” “After that, he spread a new false story.”
Smirnov agreed to plead guilty to charges of tax evasion and causing false FBI records, according to court documents.
Smirnov, 43, who has been a valued FBI informant for the past 13 years, has spent most of this time living in the Los Angeles suburbs of Calabasas, Woodland Hills and Orange, where he is dating a longtime boyfriend 15 years his senior. He lived a quiet and seemingly ordinary life with his girlfriend. county house.
Mr. Smirnov’s tenure as a confidential FBI source ended in spectacular fashion in February, when a grand jury in Los Angeles indicted him on charges of obstruction of justice and lying to federal officials.
Smirnov is being prosecuted by the same special prosecutor who brought federal gun and tax charges against Hunter Biden. Hunter was scheduled to be sentenced this month on his convictions in those cases until he was pardoned by his father.
Richer writes for The Associated Press. Los Angeles Times staff writer Matt Hamilton contributed to this report.
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