"The vast majority of counterintelligence investigations will never see the inside of a courtroom," said former FBI counterintelligence agent Asha Rangappa, an associate dean of Yale Law School. "The purpose of a counterintelligence investigation isn't to find people, build a criminal case and put them in jail." But if the work concludes without criminal charges, a Justice Department inclined to keep intelligence matters secret will invariably confront demands to reveal its findings given the extraordinary public interest in the investigation. But prosecution isn't the primary goal of a counterintelligence investigation. The most striking departure was the July news conference in which Comey detailed the bureau's decision to not recommend criminal charges against Clinton.

Source: ABC News May 02, 2017 17:05 UTC