Judge orders Justice Department to return data used to indict James Comey

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Justice Department to return data it seized in 2017 from a close friend of former FBI Director James Comey, concluding that the agency violated the constitutional rights of law professor Daniel Richman and had improperly used the material to indict Comey.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly heavily criticized Justice Department prosecutors, ruling that the data and material, an image of Richman’s hard drive along with emails from his iCloud and Columbia University email accounts, was handled with “callous disregard” for Richman’s rights.

The order is another blow to the Justice Department and prosecutors from the Eastern District of Virginia, after U.S. District Judge Cameron Currie ruled last month that former Trump attorney Lindsey Halliga