Who is James Comey's friend and leaker Daniel Richman?
The Columbia Law School professor leaked Comey's memos to the New York Times.
— -- Daniel Richman is the Columbia Law School professor through whom former FBI Director James Comey shared details of his contemporaneous memos about meetings with President Donald Trump to the New York Times.
Speaking before the Senate Intelligence Committee on June 8, Comey said he wanted to get a record of his meetings with President Donald Trump “out into the public square” so he decided to ask a friend to share the content of his memo with a reporter.
"Didn't do it myself, for a variety of reasons. But I asked him to, because I thought that might prompt the appointment of a special counsel. And so I asked a close friend of mine to do it," Comey told Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine). Collins asked who that was, and he responded, without providing a name, "A good friend of mine who’s a professor at Columbia Law School."
Richman, an adviser to Comey, confirmed to ABC News that he was the friend Comey was referring to during his testimony.
Before joining Columbia Law School, Richman served as chief appellate attorney in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and was a professor at Fordham Law School.
He has also served in New York City government under Michael Bloomberg and has worked as a consultant to the Department of Justice and the Department of the Treasury on federal criminal matters, according to the Columbia website.
At Columbia, he specializes in federal criminal law, criminal procedure and evidence. He’s written more than 30 law review articles, and has offered expert testimony at congressional hearings.
He received his undergraduate degree at Harvard University in 1980 and attended law school at Yale University, where he graduated in 1984.
Richman told ABC News in an email that he has given to the FBI all “relevant materials” related to Comey’s notes.
"Special counsel has been in contact with the committee to discuss access," he wrote. "In the meantime, I am turning the relevant materials over to the FBI."
The Senate Judiciary Committee has formally requested access to Comey’s notes as a part of its ongoing investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and any possible links between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
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