Page:Simpson-transcript-redacted.pdf/45

Glenn SimpsonPage 45 story about Vladimir Putin corruption and he lectured me about how have Vladimir Putin was not corrupt and how he was the best thing that ever happened to Russia. There are numerous documents that he published himself, interviews he gave singing the praises of Vladimir Putin. At that time I was already investigating corruption in Putin's Russia.

So this made me more curious about the history of his activities in Russia and what that might tell me about corruption in Russia, and as part of the case we became curious about whether there was something that he was hiding about his activities in Russia. So through this period while we were attempting to get him under oath we were also investigating his business practices in Russia and that research — and I should add when I say "we," I mean the lawyers were doing a lot of this work and it wasn't — I can't take responsibility or pride of place on having done all this work. We were doing it all together. It was a — you know, there were a number of lawyers involved, other people.

In the course of doing this research into what he might not want to be asked about from his 1-800-FOR-DEPO