The U.S. Justice Department has indicted former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey over a social media post prosecutors say implied violence against President Donald Trump.
U.S. media reports said the case stems from a post Comey shared last May showing seashells arranged as “86 47” on a beach.
Comey captioned the image as an “interesting shell formation” he said he saw during a walk along the shore.
Critics and Republican officials argued that “86” can mean removing or eliminating someone in American slang, while “47” referred to Trump as the 47th president of the United States.
Then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said at the time that the U.S. Secret Service would investigate because the post could encourage violence against the president.
The Secret Service later questioned Comey for several hours in Washington. Comey reportedly told investigators he had seen the shell arrangement on a beach in North Carolina.
National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard later said in a television interview that Comey “should be jailed.”
Comey deleted the post after criticism and said he had not realised some people would link the numbers to violence. Legal and security experts said the case could face court challenges because U.S. law provides strong free speech protections.
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Trump fired Comey as FBI director in 2017 during the federal investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
