What criminal charges and referrals resulted from Mueller’s investigation and what became of them?
Executive summary
Robert Mueller’s probe produced a complex mosaic of criminal actions, prosecutions and referrals: publicly it led to dozens of charges against individuals and entities—ranging from a 2018 indictment of 12 Russian intelligence officers to convictions and guilty pleas by several Trump associates—and the special counsel referred 14 separate matters to other prosecutors, most of which remain redacted or unresolved in the public record [1] [2] [3] [4].
1. The numeric tally: indictments, charges and convictions
The reports and contemporaneous tracking differ slightly, but the investigation produced roughly 37 indictments or guilty pleas and hundreds of individual criminal counts, with multiple summaries noting 34 individuals and three companies charged overall and several media tallies citing as many as 199 individual charges across those cases; publicly counted outcomes included at least seven guilty pleas or convictions and a small number of prison sentences handed down by federal courts [3] [5] [2].
2. The big-ticket prosecutions and what happened to them
Mueller’s team indicted 12 Russian intelligence officers for computer intrusions and related offenses tied to the 2016 campaign, a major foreign‑actor indictment that remains a key public product of the investigation [1]. Domestically, Paul Manafort and Rick Gates were charged with financial crimes stemming from their Ukraine consulting work; Gates pleaded guilty and cooperated while Manafort was convicted on bank and tax fraud counts and later accused of breaching a cooperation agreement [1] [6]. Other Trump associates—George Papadopoulos, Alex van der Zwaan and Roger Stone among them—faced indictments or guilty pleas for lying to investigators or related offenses; Stone was indicted on multiple counts in January 2019 and others pleaded guilty for false statements [1] [7] [8].
3. Michael Cohen, prosecutions handed off, and the Southern District of New York
Mueller’s office referred several matters to other prosecutors; Michael Cohen’s criminal case in the Southern District of New York — involving campaign finance, tax and bank charges to which he pleaded guilty in August 2018 — was one high-profile example of a referral that resulted in conviction and sentencing [9] [10]. Mueller also made referrals that led to prosecutions in other districts, such as cases connected to Paul Manafort’s Ukrainian work that were continued or expanded by U.S. attorneys in New York and Virginia [11] [12].
4. The 14 referrals: mostly black boxes, two public names
Mueller reported referring 14 instances of potential criminal activity to other law enforcement components; the report redacted discussions of 12 of those referrals as “harm to ongoing matter,” leaving two publicly identified referrals: Michael Cohen and former Obama White House counsel Gregory Craig, the latter of whom was later indicted on charges tied to his Ukraine-related work and pleaded not guilty [3] [10] [4] [12]. Journalistic and government summaries emphasize that the vast majority of those referrals remain opaque in the public record [4].
5. Cases that stalled, were dropped, or extended beyond Mueller
Not every prosecution spawned by Mueller’s work reached conviction; some cases were dropped or diverted. For example, the government later dismissed charges against two Prigozhin‑owned companies that had been indicted for interference‑related conduct, and other matters that originated in Mueller’s probe were pursued independently or remain in process with U.S. attorneys [13] [12]. Media tracking shows a pattern in which Mueller’s team sometimes prosecuted directly, sometimes secured cooperation and guilty pleas, and sometimes passed investigative leads to other prosecutors whose outcomes vary [2] [11].
6. What Mueller did not—and could not—do in court
By design and Department of Justice policy, Mueller did not make a prosecutorial determination about whether a sitting president committed a crime; his office explicitly declined to reach that conclusion in the public report and left related decisions to the Attorney General or Congress, while emphasizing obstruction episodes it viewed as significant evidence [14] [3]. That limitation explains why some readers equate the report’s detailed obstruction analysis with prosecution that never occurred: the special counsel gathered and reported evidence, pursued criminal charges against many implicated actors, and referred separate matters for other prosecutors to decide [14] [3].