Dutch lawyer Alex van der Zwaan is the first individual sentenced in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian election interference and possible Trump campaign collusion.
BBC:
... van der Zwaan, 33, was sentenced to 30 days in prison for lying to investigators about contacts with ex-Trump aide Rick Gates.
He struck a plea deal in February.
Van der Zwaan is the son-in-law of one of Russia's richest men and was the 19th person to be charged by special counsel Robert Mueller.
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In court on Tuesday, Van der Zwaan was also fined $20,000 and sentenced to two months of supervised release.
NYT:
Mr. van der Zwaan had faced up to five years in prison for deceiving federal investigators who were examining the links between Paul Manafort, Mr. Trump’s former campaign chairman; Rick Gates, Mr. Trump’s former deputy campaign manager; and the Ukrainian businessman, who was not named in court records. People familiar with the matter have identified him as Konstantin V. Kilimnik, who for years was Mr. Manafort’s right-hand man in Ukraine.
Mr. van der Zwaan, a 33-year-old Dutch citizen, knew all three men because his law firm, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, had assigned him to work with them in 2012 on a report used to defend Viktor F. Yanukovych, the pro-Russia former president of Ukraine, from international criticism over the prosecution and incarceration of a political rival.
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Mr. van der Zwaan claimed that he had had no substantive conversations with either Mr. Gates or Mr. Kilimnik in 2016. In fact, he has now admitted, he had had a series of phone calls with both men about potential criminal charges related to payments from the Ukrainian government.
Skadden was paid more than $5 million for the 2012 report, according to court documents. The payments — reported in Ukrainian government documents as amounting to only about $12,000 — were funneled through a bank account in Cyprus controlled by Mr. Manafort and Mr. Gates, court records show.
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In pleading for leniency, Mr. van der Zwaan’s attorneys argued that their client had lied partly to hide the fact that he had improperly recorded a phone call with one of his law firm’s partners about the matter. He tried to correct his mistakes by voluntarily agreeing to another interview in early December, less than a month after the interview in which he had lied.
At that point, he turned over his notes, recordings, cellphone, iPad and laptops. He has been stranded in the United States since, away from his pregnant wife who lives in their apartment in London. He has been fired by his law firm and will likely never practice law again, his attorneys pointed out.
But prosecutors alleged that Mr. van der Zwaan simply abandoned his legal ethics. “Van der Zwaan had, in the words of one witness, ‘gone native’ — that is, he had grown too close to Manafort, Gates” and Mr. Kilimnik, their sentencing memo stated.
Mr. van der Zwaan is far from an object of pity, they argued: His father-in-law, a well-known Russian oligarch, has given him and his wife substantial sums of money. “Van der Zwaan, in short, is a person to whom every advantage in life has been given, and from whom the government and the professional bar rightly expected candor and uprightness,” prosecutors said.
Ex-Skadden Lawyer Is Sentenced to 30 Days in Russia Inquiry (NYT)
Trump-Russia inquiry: Dutch lawyer Alex van der Zwaan sentenced to 30 days (BBC)
Related: The First Sentencing of the Mueller Investigation: A Van Der Zwaan-Song (Lawfare)