A law professor in our region appears to be a factor in uncovering a scheme to discredit special counsel Robert Mueller.
This week, two women have been in the national spotlight due to claims they had been approached to accuse Mueller of sexual assault. One woman’s claims cannot be verified. The second is a law professor at Vermont Law School. Jennifer Taub, who is also a cable news analyst, most frequently on CNN, has never met Mueller. She received an email signed by Simon Frick, Researcher at Surefire Intelligence, that states in part: “Tell me a decent method to contact you by telephone (or Signal, which would be ideal) and a beginning rate to talk with you about all encounters you've had with Special Counsel Mueller.”
Taub tells WAMC her initial reaction was that the correspondence was a mistake. “As I started reading my thought was to be polite and email them back and say um you know I’m sorry I don’t know him. Have a nice day. But then as I continued along the email to the next paragraph they explicitly said they were trying to dig into Robert Mueller’s past and offering to pay me some money for my time and also offering to pay me if I gave them other references. And that made me extremely suspicious. And so I promptly searched on the web to find a way to contact the Special Counsel’s office, found an email address and forwarded the email right to them.”
Surefire Intelligence is a company created by Jacob Wohl, a well known conspiracy theorist. He initially disavowed any association with the company until a press conference Thursday. While most of the session degenerated over claims by Wohl and his associate Jack Burkman that another woman would come forward with assault claims, Burkman briefly attempted to discredit Taub. “Apparently she has received an email from a person who does not exist. A person by the name of Simon something I think it’s Simon Frick on a Proton mail. But even I know how to create a Proton mail.”
Wohl added: “There were no offers of payment. There were no wrongdoing. There was no bribery. There was nothing illegal or untoward or unethical that took place here.”
Professor Taub calls the email creepy. “When we found that it might be part of a blogger smear campaign to try to pay women to allege false encounters with Mueller that’s when I really thought it was especially creepy. Because I went back and looked at the email and thought well oh is that what they you know might have been getting at. At first I just thought it was any kind of work history, anything you know. And then when I found out earlier this week that it might have been about inventing sexual assault I found that incredibly creepy and demoralizing.”
Mueller’s team reportedly alerted the FBI to the scheme.
Text of the email Professor Jennifer Taub received from Surefire Intelligence as forwarded to WAMC by Professor Taub:
From: SimonFrick.SurefireIntelligence <SimonFrick.SurefireIntelligence@protonmail.com>
Sent: Monday, October 22, 2018 12:59 PM
To: Jennifer Taub
Subject: Re: Mueller
Professor Taub,
It's my understanding that you may have had some past encounters with Robert Mueller. I would like to discuss these encounters with you. I believe a basic telephone call, for which I would compensate you for at whatever rate you see fit (inside reason), would be a good place to start.
My organization is conducting an examination of Robert Mueller's past. Tell me a decent method to contact you by telephone (or Signal, which would be ideal) and a beginning rate to talk with you about all encounters you've had with Special Counsel Mueller.
We would likewise pay you for any references that you may have. Lastly, I would appreciate your discretion here, as this is a very sensitive matter.
Very Truly Yours,
Simon Frick
Researcher at Surefire Intelligence, LTD
SurefireIntelligence.com | +41 435 880104
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