Roger Stone's Instagram post just landed him back in court

Roger Stone has just been ordered back to court, and it's all because of an Instagram post.

U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson has scheduled a hearing for Feb. 21, asking Stone to explain why his "conditions of release should not be modified or revoked in light of the posts on his Instagram account." Stone, who faces charges of witness tampering, obstruction, and making false statements, on Monday had posted a picture of Jackson with what appeared to be crosshairs next to her. He also called Jackson an "Obama appointed judge."

Stone received a partial gag order last week after Jackson warned him to stop acting like he's on a "book tour."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The longtime GOP operative and former adviser to President Trump said that he had just posted a "random photo taken from the internet" that was not "meant to threaten the judge or disrespect the court." He told The Washington Post that everyone was misinterpreting the Instagram post and that those weren't crosshairs at all but rather the logo of the organization he got the picture from. His attorneys also filed an apology with the court, which said that "Mr. Stone recognizes the impropriety and had it removed." Yet on Facebook, Stone had dismissed the controversy by calling it "another fake news story."