Papadopoulos' fiance opens up about her interview with Mueller and that mysterious London professor.

http://uk.businessinsider.com/papadopoulos-fiancee-simona-mangiante-2018-1?r=US&IR=T

Papadopoulos texted Mangiante when he landed at Dulles airport in Washington, DC on July 27 — minutes before he was arrested by the FBI. By the time he emerged from his Alexandria jail cell on July 28, Papadopoulos had become a cooperating witness in special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe.

Mangiante said she did not hear from him again until five days later, on August 1.

"It was traumatic, and completely unexpected," Mangiante said. Papadopoulos's cousin wrote to her on Facebook in the interim, explaining that he had been arrested.

"I didn't know what was going on," Mangiante said. "So I went to the US, and everything changed completely."

Mueller
Mueller confirmed that the FBI uses drones for domestic surveillance during a hearing on FBI oversight in 2013. Alex Wong/Getty

Mangiante flew to Chicago to see Papadopoulos and was promptly served with a subpoena by a federal agent working for special counsel Robert Mueller. Mueller is investigating potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, and had charged Papadopoulos with lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russia-linked foreign nationals during the election. Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to the charge.

"It was something, just, unreal," she said. "When he came to deliver my subpoena, my first reaction was to contact the Italian embassy."

The embassy told her that they could find an American lawyer to represent her in Chicago. But the rate would be about $800 per hour — money she said she didn't have. So she went into the interview without one.

"The interview lasted about two hours, and they asked a lot of questions about Joseph Mifsud," Mangiante said, referring to the London-based professor who told Papadopoulos in April 2016 that the Russians had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton in the form of "thousands of emails."

"It was shocking to me that they wanted me as a witness, but I have nothing to hide," she added. "And I think they were happy with the interview."

'I knew something was wrong from the first day I arrived'
The FBI's interest in Mangiante makes sense given the three months she spent working for Mifsud — from September through November of 2016 — at the London Centre of International Law Practice.

The organization listed Mifsud as its director as recently as October, but his biography was deleted from the website following Papadopoulos' indictment. The special counsel's statement of offense outlined Papadopoulos' contact with a London-based "professor" who was later identified as Mifsud in news reports.

Mangiante said she first met Mifsud when she started her job at the European Parliament in 2009. He described himself as someone who worked "to connect people from different governments," she said.

When her contract was up in September 2016 with the European Parliament in Brussels, Mangiante wanted to move to London. Scouring LinkedIn, she noticed that Mifsud's organization was looking to hire people with experience working for the EU.

"I knew something was wrong from the first day I arrived there," Mangiante said. "It all felt very artificial. I had worked in real diplomatic environments and this didn't feel that way at all. I never even had clarity about who [Mifsud] actually was."

Mangiante left the organization in November 2016. By that point, she had already begun chatting with Papadopoulos, who had messaged her on LinkedIn two months earlier after seeing that they shared a mutual professional connection — Mifsud.

"How do you know him?" Mangiante said Papadopoulos asked her at the time, referring to Mifsud. "What does he do?"

"Not even George really knew anything about him," Mangiante said.

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Shows they went after access to Trump and the russians were indoctrinating.She smelt a rat, she worked it out the "office" wasn't legit, it was a russian spy operation. She would need to steer clear of walks in the forest on her own.....