GOP Activist Who Sought Hillary Clinton Emails Killed Himself Body was found in hotel room located across the street from Mayo Clinic By Shane Harris and Reid J. Epstein
https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-activist-who-sought-clinton-emails-killed-self-1500002994
WASHINGTON—Peter W. Smith, a Republican political activist and financier from Chicago who mounted an effort to obtain former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emails from Russian hackers, died on May 14 after asphyxiating himself in a hotel room in Rochester, Minn., according to local authorities. He was 81 years old.
Mr. Smith’s body was found in the Aspen Suites hotel, located across the street from the Mayo Clinic, according to a medical examiner’s report. An associate of Mr. Smith said that he had recently visited the clinic. A representative for the facility wouldn’t confirm if Mr. Smith was a patient.
It wasn’t clear who found Mr. Smith’s body.
Mr. Smith died about 10 days after an interview with The Wall Street Journal in which he recounted his attempts to acquire what he believed were thousands of emails stolen from Mrs. Clinton’s private email server. He implied that Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, then serving as the senior national security adviser to presidential candidate Donald Trump, was aware of his efforts.
Mr. Smith’s attempts to obtain what he believed would be politically damaging emails marked the first potential evidence of coordination between members of the Trump campaign and Russian hackers, a central issue in probes by Congress and the Federal Bureau of Investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
When the Journal reported on Mr. Smith’s efforts last month, it wasn’t clear how he died. His obituary listed no cause of death, officials in the town where he lived didn’t release information, and messages left at Mr. Smith’s home went unanswered.
The Chicago Tribune , which first reported Mr. Smith’s cause of death on Thursday, said a pile of documents and a statement that police called a suicide note were found with his body. The note said that Mr. Smith had been ill and that he held a life-insurance policy that was due to expire, the Tribune reported.
Mr. Smith apologized in the note and said that “no foul play whatsoever” had occurred with his death, according to the Tribune.
In emails and documents meant to recruit others to his efforts to find Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails, Mr. Smith and an associate identified Mr. Flynn’s company, Flynn Intel Group, and Michael G. Flynn, the general’s son, as allies in the operation.
Neither Mr. Flynn nor his son responded to requests for comment at the time of the original article.
The group Mr. Smith assembled included technical experts, lawyers and a private investigator in Europe who spoke Russian, he said. The group made contacts with five groups of hackers, including two that were Russian, who claimed to have obtained Mrs. Clinton’s emails, Mr. Smith said. He ultimately didn’t acquire the messages because he said he couldn’t verify their authenticity. Instead, he urged the hackers to give the emails to WikiLeaks.
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