Ex-FBI Informant Charged With Lying About Bidens To Remain Jailed While Awaiting Trial

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A former FBI informant charged with fabricating a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden’s family must remain behind bars while he awaits trial, a judge ruled Monday, reversing an earlier order releasing the man.

U.S. District Judge Otis Wright II in Los Angeles ordered Alexander Smirnov’s detention after prosecutors raised concerns that the man who claims to have ties to Russian intelligence could flee the country. Wright said he did not believe there were conditions of release he could set that would guarantee Smirnov would not escape.

“There is nothing garden variety about this case,” Wright said before announcing his decision. “I have not changed my mind. This man will be remanded pending trial.”

A different judge had released Smirnov from jail on electronic GPS monitoring after his Feb. 14 arrest, but Wright ordered him to be takenback into custody last week after prosecutors asked to reconsider Smirnov’s detention. Wright said in a written order unsealed Friday that Smirnov’s lawyers’ efforts to free him were “likely to facilitate his absconding from the United States.”

Smirnov is charged with falsely telling his FBI handler that executives from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had paid President Biden and Hunter Biden $5 million each around 2015. The claim became central to the Republican impeachment inquiry of President Biden in Congress.

In urging the judge to keep him in jail, prosecutors revealed Smirnov has reported to the FBI having extensive contact with officials associated with Russian intelligence, and claimed that such officials were involved in passing a story to him about Hunter Biden. Prosecutors said Smirnov had been planning to travel overseas to