Roger Stone Apologizes To Judge Amy Berman Jackson For Instagram Post

In a court filing Monday, Roger Stone apologized for his Instagram posts about federal district court Judge Amy Berman Jackson.

The now-deleted post had an image showing crosshairs near the federal judge's head, who was overseeing his criminal case in the district court in Washington, D.C. Stone posted the same photo again without the crosshairs, however, deleted it later. In the caption, he accused the judge of running a “show trial.”

“Through legal trickery Deep State hitman Robert Mueller has guaranteed that my upcoming show trial is before judge Amy Berman Jackson, an Obama appointed judge who dismissed the Benghazi charges against Hillary Clinton and incarcerated Paul Manafort prior to his conviction for any crime,” the post said.

In the formal apology letter, Stone wrote, "Please inform the Court that the photograph and comment today was improper and should not have been posted. I had no intention of disrespecting the Court and humbly apologize to the Court for the transgression.”

Speaking to CNN, Stone said a "volunteer" posted the first photo while the second one was random and not "meant anyway to threaten the judge."

After the second photo was deleted, Stone posted a statement saying, "A photo of Judge Jackson posted on my Instagram has been misinterpreted. This was a random photo taken from the Internet. Any inference that this was meant to somehow threaten the Judge or disrespect court is categorically false."

"What some say are cross hairs are in fact the logo of the organization that originally posted it something called corruption central. They use the logo in many photos,” he wrote in another post.

Stone, President Donald Trump's longtime confidant, was taken into custody by FBI on Jan.25, after being indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. He was charged with lying to Congress, obstruction and witness tampering. Stone, however, pleaded not guilty to the charges on Jan. 29.

The indictment detailed Stone’s conversations about stolen Democratic emails posted by WikiLeaks, however, it did not accuse Stone of coordinating with Russia's interference in the 2016 U.S. elections.

On Feb.15, Jackson placed a gag order on Stone and his attorneys.

“Lawyers for the parties and the witnesses must refrain from making statements to the media or in public settings that pose a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to this case," Jackson wrote, CNN reported.

Jackson also said if Stone continued to speak out, it could harm the case.

“One factor that will be considered in the evaluation of any future request for relief based on pretrial publicity will be the extent to which the publicity was engendered by the defendant himself,” she wrote.