Feds charge man who worked with Russian co-defendant of Paul Manafort

An associate of a Russian co-defendant of ex-Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort was charged Friday with failing to register with the federal goverment as an agent of foreign interest.

The associate, 47-year-old W. Samuel Patten of Washington, D.C., is due to appear in court Friday morning in federal court in Washington.

He was charged in a criminal information filed by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, and the Justice Department's National Security Division. The charges relate to lobbying and consulting work that Patten has done since 2014 with an unidentified Russian national for a Ukraine political party known as Opposition Bloc, among other activities.

He also allegedly advised an unnamed Russian oligarch, and received payments of more than $1 million to a company he formed from that oligarch to a bank account in Cyprus, according to the criminal information. The informations says that Patten set up meetings for the oligarch with members of Congress and their staffs on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Committee on Foreign Affairs in 2015.

A criminal information is often used to charge a defendant when that person has agreed to plead guilty in the case.

Patten has ties to Konstantin Kiliminik, the suspected Russian intelligence agent who in June was charged with Manafort of trying to tamper with potential witnesses against Manafort in pending criminal cases. Kilimink had been an aide to Manafort.

Patten is accused of violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act, a felony that carries a possible maximum sentence of five years in prison.

Patten previously served as senior advisor to undersecretary of state for democracy and global affairs.

Manafort is set to go on trial next month in Washington on charges of money laundering, witness tampering, and failing to register as a foreign agent.

The longtime Republican operative was convicted last week of tax crimes and bank fraud in a separate trial in Virginia.

Both of those cases, in which Manafort has pleaded not guilty, were brought by special counsel Robert Mueller.

The cases relate to work that Manafort did in Ukraine for pro-Russia politicians.

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