Samuel Kent, the disgraced former Texas federal judge who resigned in 2009 after receiving a 33-month sentence for lying to investigators and sexual abusing two employees, told a senior analyst for the private intelligence firm Stratfor that he believes the Justice Department may have targeted him after he ruled against Halliburton in a "heavy case," according to an email leaked by WikiLeaks.
In an email to her colleagues, Stratfor senior Eurasia analyst Lauren Goodrich describes a conversation she had with Kent over lunch in 2009. Here's a look at part of the email:
For those who haven't followed this, [Kent] was found guilty on perjury & sexual misconduct. Yes, he slept with those two women, but it was consensual. Actually, they were old affairs and long over.
What Sam said was that "isn't is strange that the Justice Department begins sniffing around for dirt to throw at me just weeks after I ruled a heavy case against Halliburton. Then a small set of affairs turn into an untrue situation and then spun up into an unprecedented case against a Federal Judge."
Of course, I told him he was nuts to rule anything against Halliburton.
I also told him that this sounds like a John Grisham plotline.