Georgia Tech On Track To Pay Millions
Defense costs for Dagon, Antonakakis and Keromytis begin to mount up
October 13 Update - Please see this post for updated information
A new FOIA release reveals the extent of fees Georgia Tech has taken on, paying for the legal defenses of David Dagon, Manos Antonakakis, and Angelos Keromytis.
As you may recall, Dagon and Antonakakis were named as Researchers 1 and 2 in the indictment of Michael Sussmann. David Dagon was fully immunized by Special Counsel John Durham in July 2021.
Keromytis was an employee of DARPA at the time (before later joining Georgia Tech). As the head of the Enhanced Attribution program, he has been implicated in the scandal that continues to unfold.
Legal invoices submitted to Georgia Tech for payment show billings of $101,395.55 for Manos Antonakakis, $6,810 for Angelos Keromytis, and $454,882 for David Dagon before credits and discounts were applied.
These invoices appear to cover periods through February 2022. With the delay in billings, we expect a substantial addition to these expenses has been incurred and will continue.
This prompts a rather obvious question.
Why is Georgia Tech paying the legal fees of these researchers?
Typically, if work is done in the normal course of employment (and is not due to negligence), you might expect an employer to pick up the costs of legal representation for the employee. However, it remains unclear how or whether their work in relation to the fake Trump-Alfa server or the hack of the DNC was sanctioned by Georgia Tech or the US government.
If they exceeded their mandate, why are taxpayers on the hook for millions?
The invoices show a series of meetings and calls with Special Counsel Durham, but also a statement and communications with the New York Times before what appears to be this article which notes:
A March 23, 2022 invoice for Antonakakis notes work in February 28, 2022 connected to a Grand Jury Subpoena, which may be separate from July 2021 subpoenas previously known.
Oddly, a February 2022 invoice for David Dagon references “joint-interest” and “common defense” entries, something nonsensical for a fully immunized cooperating witness.
This calls to mind a statement provided to the New York Times by Dagon’s lawyer:
Other FOIA documents have brought to light that Dagon produced “runs” from an unnamed system to Special Counsel Durham after obtaining immunity. Is he continuing to represent the validity of the Alfa server allegations? We will have more thoughts on this later.
"one of the researchers whom the indictment discussed but did not name" = Laura Seago, right?