Who Was Seth Rich?

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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Marionumber1 » Fri Aug 16, 2019 2:54 am

@stickdog99: I completely agree with your analysis about acceptable vs. unacceptable conspiracy theories. The fact that Russian hacking is so entrenched in the mainstream psyche that you get attacked for mere skepticism of it whereas expressing suspicion over Seth Rich's death is enough to get you deplatformed is not logically justifiable. And I absolutely believe that Seth Rich's death, rather than being a random homicide, was related to his job at the DNC. All I am saying is to be careful about what you start believing after rejecting the dubious theories that "conventional wisdom" tells you to believe.

While I don't begrudge you for considering Seth a more plausible suspect for the DNC leak than Russian hackers, I still don't believe him to be a particularly plausible one. The differences in means and opportunity aren't as stark as you might think. Both Seth Rich and any hypothetical Russian hackers share the quality of not having had preexisting access to the emails: foreign hackers obviously wouldn't and Seth was a DNC employee who did not work in IT. Either way, there must have been a computer intrusion for which no actual evidence has been produced. Yes, Seth had a greater possibility of physical access and friendships with other DNC employees which might make pulling off a job easier. But it is absolutely wrong to think that merely being at the DNC gives him substantially better access to the emails when he almost certainly would have had to do some form of hacking himself.

Who the actual leaker would have been if not Seth is something I don't know, but that's not unusual. We don't know the identities of most WikiLeaks sources because part of their mission is to protect those sources. Indeed, if WikiLeaks is committed to protecting sources even posthumously, then Julian Assange's very suggestive hinting that Seth was the source seems at odds with that mission, except as a bit of misdirection. What better way to protect the real source, after all, then directing people towards a very suspicious and well-publicized homicide that superficially seems to fit?

In parapolitically-significant cases there are often several layers of possibilities before we actually approach the truth. The official narrative (e.g. Russia hacked the DNC emails) may be easy to dispatch with, but finding another narrative that seems better (e.g. Seth Rich leaked the DNC emails) isn't a sign to stop digging. Sometimes the most popular "conspiracy theory" is itself just an "official conspiracy theory" designed to hide an even better explanation. I have maintained since the story of Seth Rich's murder broke in 2016 and continue to believe to this day that his focus would have been on voting irregularities that targeted Bernie Sanders supporters, not the dirty tricks outlined in the DNC emails which are appalling but do not constitute outright election fraud in the same way registration tampering does.
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby JackRiddler » Sat Aug 17, 2019 6:30 pm

Good set of thoughts, marionumber1.

But you didn't marry yourself to a definitive conclusion, so something must be wrong. ;-)
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby liminalOyster » Sat Aug 17, 2019 7:59 pm

Marionumber1 » Fri Aug 16, 2019 2:54 am wrote:@stickdog99: I completely agree with your analysis about acceptable vs. unacceptable conspiracy theories.


Relevant sidenote:

Washington Post editor attacks Bernie Sanders’ ‘conspiracy theory’
By MICHAEL CALDERONE 08/13/2019 11:49 AM EDT Updated 08/13/2019 09:22 PM EDT
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Washington Post executive editor Marty Baron bashed Sen. Bernie Sanders for pushing a “conspiracy theory” that the paper’s news coverage is influenced by its owner, Amazon chief Jeff Bezos.

“Sen. Sanders is a member of a large club of politicians — of every ideology — who complain about their coverage,” Baron said in a statement. “Contrary to the conspiracy theory the senator seems to favor, Jeff Bezos allows our newsroom to operate with full independence, as our reporters and editors can attest.”

Sanders spoke Monday on the presidential campaign trail in Wolfeboro, N.H., about how Amazon paid no money in taxes last year.

“I talk about that all of the time,” Sanders continued. “And then I wonder why The Washington Post — which is owned by Jeff Bezos, who owns Amazon — doesn’t write particularly good articles about me. I don’t know why. But I guess maybe there’s a connection. Maybe we helped raise the minimum wage at Amazon to 15 bucks an hour.”

Sanders has long accused the “corporate media” of putting the interests of the elite above those of the majority of Americans. But Sanders’ swipe on Monday went a step beyond his usual media critique in suggesting a news organization covered him unfairly because of its owner. His comments echoed those of President Donald Trump, who has blamed Bezos for unflattering coverage in the paper, calling the Post “the Amazon Washington Post” in tweets.

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“The hyperoverreaction from many in the media to Senator Sanders' critique reveals a bias,” Sanders’ campaign manager, Faiz Shakir, wrote in an email. “There is a sneering, contemptuous disdain that infuses those comments and a willingness to put words into Bernie's mouth that he just didn't use.”

The Vermont senator’s presidential campaign has been especially critical of the news media, suggesting that journalists are dismissing his candidacy. Shakir told POLITICO last month that “there are a healthy number [of journalists] who just find Bernie annoying, discount his seriousness, and wish his supporters and movement would just go away.”

Sanders isn’t the only Democrat airing grievances about the media. Several 2020 presidential candidates took aim at The New York Times last week over a headline framing Trump's comments after two mass shootings. The Twitter backlash against the Times came a day after former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke responded to a reporter’s question in El Paso, Texas, about how Trump could improve things after the shootings with, “What the fuck?”

“A vast swath of Democratic voters are pretty angry at the media,” Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior Obama aide and current co-host of “Pod Save America,” told POLITICO. “For the first time in my career, making the press a foil is good politics in a Democratic primary.”

Former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign isn’t happy with news coverage either. On Monday, senior adviser Symone Sanders suggested on CNN the national “press narrative” is different than the “voter narrative.”

The news media has recently covered several of Biden’s misstatements, which POLITICO’s Natasha Korecki and Marc Caputo report have undercut his message on the campaign trail. Sanders suggested the gaffes do not matter. “This is not something that’s registering with the American people,” she said.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/ ... ry-1460597
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby JackRiddler » Sun Aug 18, 2019 9:47 am

Hardly the first time when the simple Chomsky-Herman understanding of class society and the role of corporate media ownership and structure within it in perpetuating a propaganda system aligned with the overall structures of the political economy and society is characterized as "conspiracy theory," a non-sequitur so absurd and unwarranted its use is predicated on nothing more than invocation of the magic words with no engagement of theses or evidence given, or even possible.

"Did you ever notice who employs you, and how things function over at your workplace?"

"HOW DARE YOU, I SAY, HAVE YOU NO DECENCY, HAVE YOU FINALLY NO DECENCY AT ALL?!"


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLcpcytUnWU

"I'm not saying you're self-censoring. I'm sure you believe everything you're saying. But what I am saying is if you believed something different, you wouldn't be sitting where you are sitting." Then watch the empty suit feel that penny drop in his worm brain. No need for Chomsky to add the thuglife smackdown kicker: BUT I WOULD! I'D BE SITTING RIGHT HERE.

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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sun Aug 18, 2019 11:59 am

.

A resounding Yes to all above - our collective sentiment on that utterly loathsome phrase is well documented in RI.

"conspiracy theory," a non-sequitur so absurd and unwarranted its use is predicated on nothing more than invocation of the magic words with no engagement of theses or evidence given, or even possible.


Exactly. Even more irritating/disappointing (yet predictable) is how the Average Consumer lazily appropriates that phrase in their every day lexicon, both in spoken word and in social media 'comments'.

It's everywhere. And yet, despite it all, the number of humans awakening to see through the BS/white noise steadily increases. There is reason for optimism (and also reason for pessimism...it can go either way -- or worse, remain status quo).

...

http://citywireusa.com/registered-inves ... r/a1258172



Judge greenlights advisor Ed Butowsky’s libel suit against NPR


08 August 2019

Investment advisor Ed Butowsky’s $57 million libel suit against National Public Radio over Seth Rich reports can proceed, a judge rules.

A federal judge has given Texas investment advisor Ed Butowsky the greenlight on a $57 million libel suit against National Public Radio over news reports about conspiracy theories surrounding the death of a Democratic National Committee staffer during the 2016 presidential campaign.

The judge rejected NPR’s bid to dismiss the suit, which Butowsky filed in June 2018, on Wednesday.

Judge Amos Mazzant of US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas ruled that Butowsky made plausible claims that the media organization defamed him in online stories about Butowsky’s role in publicizing assertions that staffer Seth Rich may have been involved in leaking Democratic emails.

NPR’s attorneys argued that the reports in question, by correspondent David Folkenflik, accurately described a defamation lawsuit filed by Rod Wheeler, a private investigator and former homicide detective hired by Butowsky to explore the Rich case, against Fox News and Butowsky. Wheeler had accused Fox of fabricating quotations in a story about Rich’s murder, but his case was dismissed last summer.

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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 13, 2019 2:07 pm

2nd Circuit decision today reinstates the Rich family’s case.
Image
https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw

http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/i ... 21_opn.pdf


Powerful passage from the Rich v. Fox ruling.
Image
https://twitter.com/KlasfeldReports/sta ... 4816784384
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Elvis » Fri Sep 13, 2019 4:24 pm

^^^^ Let them sue, and let there be a trial to answer the question of Rich leaking emails. If any shadow of a doubt remains, they have no case, and who knows what a trial might unearth.

The court document runs onto some problems of logic; first sentence makes an assertion that hasn't been proven, so everything that follows from that premise has a problem.


I find Sy Hersh more credible:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VaQcglmZvY


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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Harvey » Thu Dec 05, 2019 6:49 pm

And while we spoke of many things, fools and kings
This he said to me
"The greatest thing
You'll ever learn
Is just to love
And be loved
In return"


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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Grizzly » Thu Dec 05, 2019 7:40 pm

Where's the jaw drop emoji? ^^^ Thanks Harv
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Elvis » Thu Dec 05, 2019 7:49 pm

Ray McGovern ^^^^ — more GOLD — thanks, Harvey.
“The purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists.” ― Joan Robinson
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby stickdog99 » Wed Jan 29, 2020 10:31 pm

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives ... seth-rich/

A persistent American lawyer has uncovered the undeniable fact that the FBI has been continuously lying, including giving false testimony in court, in response to Freedom of Information requests for its records on Seth Rich. The FBI has previously given affidavits that it has no records regarding Seth Rich.

A Freedom of Information request to the FBI which did not mention Seth Rich, but asked for all email correspondence between FBI Head of Counterterrorism Peter Strzok, who headed the investigation into the DNC leaks and Wikileaks, and FBI attorney Lisa Page, has revealed two pages of emails which do not merely mention Seth Rich but have “Seth Rich” as their heading. The emails were provided in, to say the least, heavily redacted form.

Image

Image


Before I analyse these particular emails, I should make plain that they are not the major point. The major point is that the FBI claimed it had no records mentioning Seth Rich, and these have come to light in response to a different FOIA request that was not about him. What other falsely denied documents does the FBI hold about Rich, that were not fortuitously picked up by a search for correspondence between two named individuals?

To look at the documents themselves, they have to be read from the bottom up, and they consist of a series of emails between members of the Washington Field Office of the FBI (WF in the telegrams) into which Strzok was copied in, and which he ultimately forwarded on to the lawyer Lisa Page.

The opening email, at the bottom, dated 10 August 2016 at 10.32am, precisely just one month after the murder of Seth Rich, is from the media handling department of the Washington Field Office. It references Wikileaks’ offer of a reward for information on the murder of Seth Rich, and that Assange seemed to imply Rich was the source of the DNC leaks. The media handlers are asking the operations side of the FBI field office for any information on the case. The unredacted part of the reply fits with the official narrative. The redacted individual officer is “not aware of any specific involvement” by the FBI in the Seth Rich case. But his next sentence is completely redacted. Why?

It appears that “adding” references a new person added in to the list. This appears to have not worked, and probably the same person (precisely same length of deleted name) then tries again, with “adding … for real” and blames the technology – “stupid Samsung”. The interesting point here is that the person added appears not to be in the FBI – a new redacted addressee does indeed appear, and unlike all the others does not have an FBI suffix after their deleted email address. So who are they?

(This section on “adding” was updated after commenters offered a better explanation than my original one. See first comments below).

The fourth email, at 1pm on Wednesday August 10, 2016, is much the most interesting. It is ostensibly also from the Washington Field Office, but it is from somebody using a different classified email system with a very different time and date format than the others. It is apparently from somebody more senior, as the reply to it is “will do”. And every single word of this instruction has been blanked. The final email, saying that “I squashed this with …..”, is from a new person again, with the shortest name. That phrase may only have meant I denied this to a journalist, or it may have been reporting an operational command given.

As the final act in this drama, Strzok then sent the whole thread on to the lawyer, which is why we now have it. Why?

It is perfectly possible to fill in the blanks with a conversation that completely fits the official narrative. The deletions could say this was a waste of time and the FBI was not looking at the Rich case. But in that case, the FBI would have been delighted to publish it unredacted. (The small numbers in the right hand margins supposedly detail the exception to the FOIA under which deletion was made. In almost every case they are one or other category of invasion of privacy).

And if it just all said “Assange is talking nonsense. Seth Rich is nothing to do with the FBI” then why would that have to be sent on by Strzok to the FBI lawyer?

It is of course fortunate that Strzok did forward this one email thread on to the lawyer, because that is the only reason we have seen it, as a result of an FOI(A) request for the correspondence between those two.

Finally, and perhaps this is the most important point, the FBI was at this time supposed to be in the early stages of an investigation into how the DNC emails were leaked to Wikileaks. The FBI here believed Wikileaks to be indicating the material had been leaked by Seth Rich who had then been murdered. Surely in any legitimate investigation, the investigators would have been absolutely compelled to check out the truth of this possibility, rather than treat it as a media issue?

We are asked to believe that not one of these emails says “well if the publisher of the emails says Seth Rich was the source, we had better check that out, especially as he was murdered with no sign of a suspect”. If the FBI really did not look at that, why on earth not? If the FBI genuinely, as they claim, did not even look at the murder of Seth Rich, that would surely be the most damning fact of all and reveal their “investigation” was entirely agenda driven from the start.

In June 2016 a vast cache of the DNC emails were leaked to Wikileaks. On 10 July 2016 an employee from the location of the leak was murdered without obvious motive, in an alleged street robbery in which nothing at all was stolen. Not to investigate the possibility of a link between the two incidents would be grossly negligent. It is worth adding that, contrary to a propaganda barrage, Bloomingdale where Rich was murdered is a very pleasant area of Washington DC and by no means a murder hotspot. It is also worth noting that not only is there no suspect in Seth Rich’s murder, there has never been any semblance of a serious effort to find the killer. Washington police appear perfectly happy simply to write this case off.

I anticipate two responses to this article in terms of irrelevant and illogical whataboutery:

Firstly, it is very often the case that family members are extremely resistant to the notion that the murder of a relative may have wider political implications. This is perfectly natural. The appalling grief of losing a loved one to murder is extraordinary; to reject the cognitive dissonance of having your political worldview shattered at the same time is very natural. In the case of David Kelly, of Seth Rich, and of Wille Macrae, we see families reacting with emotional hostility to the notion that the death raises wider questions. Occasionally the motive may be still more mixed, with the prior relationship between the family and the deceased subject to other strains (I am not referencing the Rich case here).

You do occasionally get particularly stout hearted family who take the opposite tack and are prepared to take on the authorities in the search for justice, of which Commander Robert Green, son of Hilda Murrell, is a worthy example.

(As an interesting aside, I just checked his name in the Wikipedia article on Hilda, which I discovered describes Tam Dalyell “hounding” Margaret Thatcher over the Belgrano and the fact that ship was steaming away from the Falklands when destroyed with massive loss of life as a “second conspiracy theory”, the first of course being the murder of Hilda Murrell. Wikipedia really has become a cesspool.)

We have powerful cultural taboos that reinforce the notion that if the family do not want the question of the death of their loved one disturbed, nobody else should bring it up. Seth Rich’s parents, David Kelly’s wife, Willie Macrae’s brother have all been deployed by the media and the powers behind them to this effect, among many other examples. This is an emotionally powerful but logically weak method of restricting enquiry.

Secondly, I do not know and I deliberately have not inquired what are the views on other subjects of either Mr Ty Clevenger, who brought his evidence and blog to my attention, or Judicial Watch, who made the FOIA request that revealed these documents. I am interested in the evidence presented both that the FBI lied, and in the documents themselves. Those who obtained the documents may, for all I know, be dedicated otter baiters or believe in stealing ice cream from children. I am referencing the evidence they have obtained in this particular case, not endorsing – or condemning – anything else in their lives or work. I really have had enough of illogical detraction by association as a way of avoiding logical argument by an absurd extension of ad hominem argument to third parties.
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Elvis » Thu Jan 30, 2020 12:22 am

stickdog99 wrote:https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives ... seth-rich/

Thank you. I should be checking Murray's blog regularly, but only so much time & brain bandwidth; I very much appreciate this huge shiny nugget.


The words of Seymour Hersh resound in my ears; it's been awhile since I heard the recording, but I think he repeated the words for emphasis...

"Clapper knows what I know."


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYzB96_EK7s
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby Belligerent Savant » Sat Feb 01, 2020 9:52 am

.

Came here to post the Craig Murray piece but stickdog took care of it already.

Good stuff.



Craig Murray:

...perhaps this is the most important point, the FBI was at this time supposed to be in the early stages of an investigation into how the DNC emails were leaked to Wikileaks. The FBI here believed Wikileaks to be indicating the material had been leaked by Seth Rich who had then been murdered. Surely in any legitimate investigation, the investigators would have been absolutely compelled to check out the truth of this possibility, rather than treat it as a media issue?

We are asked to believe that not one of these emails says “well if the publisher of the emails says Seth Rich was the source, we had better check that out, especially as he was murdered with no sign of a suspect”. If the FBI really did not look at that, why on earth not? If the FBI genuinely, as they claim, did not even look at the murder of Seth Rich, that would surely be the most damning fact of all and reveal their “investigation” was entirely agenda driven from the start.
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby stickdog99 » Tue Mar 31, 2020 4:45 pm

Dubious source, but that sort of goes with the territory:

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/0 ... -computer/
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Re: Who Was Seth Rich?

Postby liminalOyster » Thu Oct 08, 2020 3:47 pm

Judge Orders Twitter To Unmask FBI Impersonator Who Set Off Seth Rich Conspiracy
October 7, 20206:57 PM ET

A federal judge in California has ordered that Twitter reveal the identity of an anonymous user who allegedly fabricated an FBI document to spread a conspiracy theory about the killing of Seth Rich, the Democratic National Committee staffer who died in 2016.

The ruling could lead to the identification of the person behind the Twitter name @whyspertech. Through that account, the user allegedly provided forged FBI materials to Fox News. The documents falsely linked Rich's killing to the WikiLeaks hack of Democratic Party emails in the lead-up to the 2016 election.

While Twitter fought to keep the user's identity secret, U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu in Oakland, Calif., ordered on Tuesday that the tech company must turn over the information to attorneys representing Rich's family in a defamation suit by Oct. 20.

It is the latest twist in a years-long saga over a conspiracy theory that rocked Washington, caused a grieving family a great deal of pain and set off multiple legal battles.

In a now-retracted story, Fox News falsely claimed that Rich's computer was connected to the leak of Democratic Party emails provided to WikiLeaks, and that Rich's slaying was related to the purported leak. The theory was even debunked in special counsel Robert Mueller's report.

The Washington Times later reported in 2018 that Rich's brother, Aaron Rich, helped steal the emails in exchange for money from WikiLeaks and that he knew his brother would be killed and did nothing to stop it. None of those allegations are true. That story has also been retracted.

Behind Fox News' Baseless Seth Rich Story: The Untold Tale
MEDIA
Behind Fox News' Baseless Seth Rich Story: The Untold Tale
But the Rich family insists that the baseless story is still causing real harm. Aaron Rich filed a defamation lawsuit against money manager and former Fox News guest Ed Butowsky; Matt Couch, a far-right activist; America First Media, Couch's media company; and The Washington Times, which later reached a settlement.

As the defamation case moves toward trial, one major question has been what unnamed "federal investigator" supposedly reviewed an "FBI forensic report" and shared information with Butowsky and others.

Attorneys for Aaron Rich say they believe it was the now-deactivated Twitter account @whyspertech, and the judge's ordering Twitter to provide information about that account could help them get closer to an answer.

"Learning the identity of @whysprtech is necessary in order to confirm that @whysprtech was not in fact a FBI 'insider' or otherwise someone who had access to non-public FBI material," Benedict Hu wrote in a filing.

Over the course of gathering evidence for the defamation case, nobody has been willing to confirm the identity of @whysprtech, Hur noted.

Attorney Julie Schwartz, who is representing Twitter, did not return requests for comment. It is unclear if Twitter intends to appeal.

The subpoena does not seek private messages sent by the account, but merely "limited account registration information" and the user's IP address. If Twitter complies with the judge's order, the account information will be available to Aaron Rich's attorneys, though it could eventually become public in later court filings.

Twitter: Unmasking violates free speech

Twitter fought to have the subpoena killed. In court filings, attorneys for the social media giant claimed such a disclosure would violate the First Amendment rights of a user to be anonymous.

"Twitter's primary goal is to ensure that the subpoena not be used to chill anonymous speech that does not rise to the level of defamation," Schwartz wrote in a motion to have the subpoena thrown out.

Yet lawyers for Aaron Rich said the person who hid behind the @whyspertech Twitter handle to fuel a harmful conspiracy theory should be exposed.

Are Conspiracy Theories Good For Facebook?
PLANET MONEY
Are Conspiracy Theories Good For Facebook?
"Plaintiff seeks to demonstrate the reach of the forged FBI report on the false information spread by Defendants, but cannot do so without serving discovery on the anonymous user who disseminated that report," Hur wrote.

The judge sided with Aaron Rich, noting that the law "weighs towards disclosing the anonymous user's account information."

"The information sought is proportional to the needs of the case because the subpoena is limited in scope and Twitter does not argue that responding would pose an undue burden," Ryu wrote.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who is imprisoned in Britain awaiting the outcome of a U.S. push to have him extradited to face espionage charges, was also subpoenaed in the defamation case.

The 2016 killing of Seth Rich, in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Washington, D.C., remains unsolved. Law enforcement have maintained that Rich was the victim of an armed robbery.

Disclosure: NPR is involved in one of the legal battles tied to the Seth Rich controversy. Ed Butowsky has filed a defamation suit against NPR and NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik over the network's coverage of the Fox News story on Rich that has since been retracted.

https://www.npr.org/2020/10/07/92128547 ... conspiracy
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