An associate of President Donald Trump’s former political adviser Roger Stone is suing Special Counsel Robert Mueller for allegedly blackmailing him to provide false testimony.
The plaintiff, Jerome Corsi, a conservative writer and conspiracy theorist, figures into the Russia investigation as a potential link between Stone and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Corsi had emailed Stone about leaked emails from Democratic National Committee officials two months before WikiLeaks published them.
In the suit, which also names the Justice Department, the FBI, the National Security Agency, and the CIA, Corsi alleges Mueller and his team threatened to imprison him for life unless he provided false testimony stating he acted as a liaison between Stone and Assange. Corsi argues he used “investigative deduction” to determine WikiLeaks would release the emails, and did not collude.
The suit also claims Mueller and his staff leaked grand jury information about Corsi to the press, violating his right to privacy. Corsi also states in the suit that Mueller and the government agencies conducted illegal surveillance on him, despite having previously said he willingly handed over his electronic devices.
“This illegal and unconstitutional surveillance is being conducted in conjunction with Defendant Mueller’s investigation, at the direction of Mueller and his partisan Democrat, leftist, and ethically and legally conflicted prosecutorial staff in order to try to uncover information that can be used by Defendant Mueller to coerce, extort, threaten and/or blackmail Plaintiff Corsi into testifying falsely to implicate the president of the United States in crimes and have him removed from office,” the suit says.
Corsi is seeking $350 million in damages.
According to the filing, Mueller and the other defendants are attempting to “effectively wage a ‘legal coup d’etat,’ negating the will of the American voters who elected Donald J. Trump.”
A spokesman for the special counsel’s office, Peter Carr, told Fortune the office declines to comment on the suit.
Corsi, who reportedly signed a joint defense agreement with Trump recently, also filed a complaint with the Justice Department last week over Mueller’s conduct, claiming the special counsel and his staff committed gross ethical violations and crimes such as treason, Politico reports.
