WASHINGTON _ James Comey violated bureau policies in handling memos that he wrote to document interactions with President Donald Trump, according to the Justice Department's inspector general, who also found that the former FBI director didn't disclose classified information.
"Comey violated department and FBI policies pertaining to the retention, handling, and dissemination of FBI records and information," Inspector General Michael Horowitz concluded in a report released on Thursday.
Horowitz referred Comey for criminal prosecution, but the Justice Department declined to charge him. The former FBI chief, who Trump has frequently denounced, emphasized on Twitter that the inspector general "found no evidence that Comey or his attorneys released any of the classified information contained in any of the memos to members of the media."
"I don't need a public apology from those who defamed me, but a quick message with a 'sorry we lied about you' would be nice," Comey added.
Still, the long-anticipated report offers a damaging assessment of actions Comey took after he was fired by Trump in May 2017. According to the report, Comey kept four out of seven personal memos he wrote about conversations with the president in a safe at his home and violated FBI policy by failing to notify the bureau that he retained them.
"Comey also failed to fulfill his obligation to immediately alert the FBI about his disclosures to his private attorneys once he became aware that the FBI, after Comey's removal, had determined that one of the memos included several words, the names of foreign countries being discussed by the President, that were classified at the CONFIDENTIAL level,"according to a summary of the report.
