NY: Trump on Trial!

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Hopefully the DA has been talked out of it.  Whatever you think of Trump, this leads nowhere good.  Would likely result in every former president being prosecuted going forward. 

You are a reasonable and insightful poster, so I ask seriously, what is your concern?

If a former President has not actually broken the law, then if they are prosecuted with something without a real basis, I hope we could rely on them being acquitted by the justice system.

If you think that purely vindictive repeated prosecutions in which the prosecutor has no actual case would be an unfair annoyance to former Presidents who have actually done nothing wrong, I do agree that if that happened it would be a problem.

But if something like that were to happen, I would have thought the solution would not be to say that former Presidents can never be prosecuted for genuine crimes, but instead I would have thought the solution would be something like proposing some sort of legislation aimed at discouraging prosecutors from doing that, and punishing or disciplining prosecutors who act in that sort of way if they do so and repeatedly are unable to get convictions etc.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Trump's alleged acts are different from one another, and they occurred at widely distant times. But it's just coincidence or good timing that the investigations and charges happen at the same time, right after he announced his candidacy, in a manner that allows the Dems to pile on?

Nope, that's not a coincidence either.

Trump announced his candidacy early because he knew he was at grave legal jeopardy for his numerous crimes and is hoping that being a candidate for President will help him to avoid successful prosecution, or alternatively would eventually lead to pardon(s), due to the general hesitancy of the legal system to prosecute a President or former President.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

And also, regarding the timing of this present investigation in New York, that is definitely not a coincidence either.

The reason why it didn't occur already several years ago (and on the Federal level) is because Trump was President at the time, and he appointed Barr as Attorney General, and Barr directly interfered in the investigation and ordered that it be dropped, on the grounds that Trump was President.

So it is no coincidence that this only began to be pursued again recently, after Trump was no longer President, instead it is a direct result of Trump's attempts to use his power as President to obstruct justice with Barr's help.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

The fact that Andrew Cuomo was once popular in the Democratic Party does not mean that Democarts believe he is automatically correct in everything he says...

Redban's take on this is one of the weirdest misfires I've seen on the forum lately.

The reason why Redban thinks this is that the only relation between voters and politicians imaginable to Trump supporters is the same slavish and unconditional devotion that Republicans feel towards Trump. Redban simply can't imagine that anything else besides cult membership could be possible, so surely Democrats must mindlessly support Andrew Cuomo in everything that he ever did or said.

It's all projection.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

We may not even get to see the mugshot, depending on how the negotiations with Trump’s lawyers go.

How in the world is that up for negotiation with Trump's lawyers in the first place?

When ordinary people are arrested, there is no negotiation.

"Oh, but I don't want to have a mug shot officer, what if I..."

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

https://twitter.com/krassenstein/status/1642859412824965120

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Alright, lock up Donald Trump Jr. Going after a judge's daughter - not even just the judge himself, but his daughter - is unacceptable and must be punished.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

https://twitter.com/KatiePhang/status/1776338329442701683
https://twitter.com/KatiePhang/status/1776364002546696204
https://twitter.com/KatiePhang/status/1776367105874542700
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776347398966477136
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776354836562239547
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776356132518322679
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776357092271562887
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776358561464877179
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776360706205515833
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776362405691359398
https://twitter.com/lawofruby/status/1776364921128652888
https://twitter.com/AWeissmann_/status/1776366036180172820

When you are posting a message like that, can you please perhaps post even just a 1 sentence summary of the point this is all supposed to convey?

This way we could have some way of telling if we should really click laboriously on 12 different popup links.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

CNN (TV): Jury selection is underway and the prosecution is making a motion to sanction Trump for violating his gag order

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

In some ways, it would be surprising if they get a single juror off of the original 96 for this sort of trial so I don't think it is particularly significant.

You are exaggerating how difficult it is. Yes, it is difficult to find a fair jury, but it is not some impossible thing, and there have been cases in the past that are just as (or more) high profile.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

one older IT training consultant who prioritizes his family (probably good for Trump and his defense that he paid the hush money to protect his family)

ROFLMAO

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I haven’t followed the details of each individual juror, but I’m surprised the prosecution is letting lawyers onto the jury.  I had thought it was common knowledge that lawyers were generally good for the defendant.  I myself was once seated as a potential juror in a criminal trial (I think a drug sale case), but was dismissed by the prosecution when I told them I had a law degree.

Lawyers usually get struck. As do engineers. Really anyone with an advanced degree. But each side only gets so many strikes, and sometimes there are just worse jurors in the pool that are a higher priority to use your strikes on.

Part of the issue with the peremptory challenges is that they are not first questioning ALL the prospective jurors and then doing the peremptory challenges, but instead each side has to decide whether or not to use a permeptory challenge sequentially after each individual prospective juror is interviewed.

The result of doing it this way is that whichever side runs out of peremptory challenges first might end up being stuck with a SUPER unfavorable/biased juror against them which they would have wanted to use one of their peremptory challenges on, but then have no challenge left because they used them on someone who was not as bad for them.

Ideally, it seems to me that it would be better to examine ALL the potential jurors first, and then each side would know all the potential jurors and then use their challenges, because this would eliminate that additional element of randomness that comes only as a result of the ORDER in which potential jurors are questioned.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

This video suggests, as a general principle, that statistically you should look at 37% of the possibilities before making a decision (using a challenge). But I haven't tried to figure out how this is affected by having the ability to make multiple challenges.

(go to 12:03)

Interesting analysis.

There is also one other difference, besides having multiple (10) challenges. That is that rather than getting what you select, what you are actually getting (i.e. what ends up on the jury) are the people that you do NOT select to use a challenge on.

Plus there is an interaction with the choices the other side makes (hypothetically both sides might want to strike the same juror, for example there was one that said something unclear about Trump under questioning).

A further complication is that if the other side uses their challenges super fast (i.e. if they use them all on the first 10 potential jurors or something extreme for purposes of the example), then you won't necessarily have an opportunity to use all your remaining challenges on prospective jurors that you don't like. Because then the subsequent 10 that come up might all be ones that are not necessarily ideal for you, but not so bad that you would want to use a challenge on.

So if the other side is using challenges quickly, you are incentivized to do the same so as not to have too many more left than the other side that could potentially be wasted.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

This trial is already exposing a schism among progressive election law scholars to an extent that I’ve very rarely seen….exemplified by the current Twitter feud between Rick Hasen and Laurence Tribe.

Perhaps you can say what is disputed in the twitter feud for those of us who do not want to support the evil empire by making an account.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Mods, might be a good time to update the thread title, since the trial is underway and a jury has been selected (other than the few remaining alternates)?

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

The political leanings must be a factor when the defendant is the nominee of one of the parties.

Is there some sort of reason why this "must be" the case other than the fact that you say so?

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

A fair-minded person idiot would not even consider a possibility that they would be a target of intimidation.

ftfy

Trump has a documented history of fomenting threats and violence against people who are merely doing there jobs out of civic duty, such as polling place workers.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Hopefully he will survive.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Regardless of why this person set themselves on fire (who knows, it could have even been a way to get more attention about some totally different issue like Israel/Palestine or something), I think it is a clear signal that security should be increased further for everything involving this trial, because if that can happen, who knows what else could happen in the area of people involved in the trial.

Judge Merchan should make some further orders and provisions to ensure the safety and wellbeing of everyone involved in the trial in any way.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Are they gonna be sequestered. I imagine they will be

Especially given the fire issue, I hope so.

That is a clear signal not to mess around or take any chances with this, if there was any doubt before.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Do anyone else think that Bragg is leaving a much stronger case on the table by concentrating on this election interference stuff?

The basic facts of this case are that Trump falsified business records to cover up affairs.  In order for the falsification to be a felony, it needs to be in furtherance of another crime.  So to do this, Bragg for some reason thinks he needs to think of some convoluted way in which the hush money payments constitute election interference or campaign finance violations.  This part of the case has always struck me as incredibly weak.

But he shouldn't need to do this.
Adultery in New York is a crime.  If you are falsifying records to cover up an affair, it can be prosecuted as a felony because the affair itself in the underlying crime.
Trump might not be guilty of adultery with Stormy Daniels, because my impression was the affair was not conducted in New York.  But he almost certainly did commit adultery in New York with Karen McDougal.

So why not concentrate this case on the payments to McDougal to cover up the crime of adultery, and just leave out any feeble connection to election interference?

I know the adultery law in New York might not be popular, but an unbiased jury would be expected to uphold the law whether they like it or not, and this seems like an ironclad case if judged by the letter of the law.

Interesting, I hadn't heard that adultery is supposedly a crime. If it is, that is obviously unconstitutional under the Supreme Court's precedent (Griswold, Obergefell etc).

So the problem with convicting Trump on that basis is it would be easy for SCOTUS to overturn on appeal.

Though given that the Supreme Court is dominated by Conservatives, it would be an interesting/difficult case for them insofar as their ideology would be conflicting with their hackery.

The additional problem is it quite possible for a jury (or even just a single juror) to potential do jury nullification on that basis.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

The guy who lit himself on fire according to the NYPD press conference is "Maxwell Azarrello" from St Augustine FL.

Quick search shows someone with the same name filed a lawsuit against the Clinton foundation etc

https://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/new-york/nysdce/1:2023cv03197/597363/5

ORDER: On May 10, 2023, the Court directed Plaintiff to show cause, by filing a written declaration, why this case should not be dismissed for lack of standing and lack of subject matter jurisdiction. (ECF No. 4.) Plaintiff was warned that if Pl aintiff failed to submit a declaration within 30 days, or if the declaration did not show that Plaintiff has standing to sue and that the Court has subject matter jurisdiction of this action, the complaint would be dismissed. (Id.) Plaintiff has f ailed to file any communication. Accordingly, in light of Plaintiff's failure to respond to the Court's Order, this case is DISMISSED without prejudice. The Clerk is directed to close the case. SO ORDERED. (Signed by Judge J. Paul Oetken on 10/26/2023) (tg)

And also was a defendent in a case in Florida:

https://unicourt.com/case/fl-sjr-caseez8a8d43979b29-185570

On 08/28/2023 STATE OF FLORIDA filed an Other - Other Criminal lawsuit against AZZARELLO, MAXWELL CROSBY. This case was filed in St. Johns County Courts, Richard O. Watson Judicial Center located in St. Johns, Florida. The Judge overseeing this case is BLOCKER, LAUREN P. The case status is Disposed - Other Disposed.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I don't think that guy is necessarily Maga. He said he also follows Cohen on X who roasts Trump all the time (but he's only doing it in case there's anything that might move the markets). And he said he hasn't seen any evidence in this case. But he also follows right wingers for the same reason and has read quotes from Art of the Deal. So who knows. But ok suppose there's 11 people who want to convict and he thinks there's evidence to convict and he wants to be a holdout because Trump. That's a difficult position to be in. A true believer might hang on but probably not someone who just leans right and didn't even know the details of this case beforehand.

In addition, he said he listed to "Mueller she wrote" podcast, and pays close attention to Israel/Ukraine news.

Mueller she wrote in particular is not something that any Trump cultist would ever listen to, and is also not something you would listen to at all if all you care about is quick breaking news that moves markets quickly.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/04/16/jury-trump-hush-money-trial/

    This juror said he follows former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen on Twitter. Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and confidant, arranged the hush money payment to Daniels in 2016 and is expected to be a key witness in the case.
    He said he also follows former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway on Twitter, as well as other figures on the right and left. The juror, an investment banker, said he did so because of his work in finance.
    “Anything that might move the markets, I might need to know about,” the juror said.
    During questioning by Trump’s defense team, he said Trump had done some good for the country. “It’s ambivalent. It goes both ways,” he said.
    He said he has listened to “Mueller She Wrote,” a podcast about the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, and consumes news about Ukraine and Israel. He told the court he hadn’t read “The Art of the Deal,” Trump’s book on business strategy, but had seen quotes from it.
    He lives in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I don’t see how this can be true.  The case involves several very complicated and thorny issues of statutory and regulatory intepretation, constitutional rights of the criminally accused, and state versus federal jurisdiction that even progressive election law scholars are thoroughly divided on.  I’m a progressive election law scholar myself who has been skeptical of these charges from the outset, and the prosecution has done almost nothing the address my concerns.

Typically the job of juries is to decide "questions of fact," whereas it is the job of judges to decide "questions of law." This is partly because most jurors are non-lawyers and are not expected to be able to decide, or to decide, questions about things like statutory interpretation (although funnily enough, this particular case has 2 lawyer-jurors).

Juries are typically thought to be supposed to take the judge's interpretation of law as a given, and to follow the instructions given to them by the judge as to what the law is.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/question_of_law

A question of law is an issue that is always resolved by a judge, not a jury, including:

    A question regarding the application or interpretation of a law
    A question regarding what the relevant law is, if there are two or more mutually exclusive laws, a judge determines which law is relevant
    A question that has been authoritatively answered by law, or
    A question of fact that nevertheless has been reserved for judges, not juries, to resolve

Questions of law are distinct from questions of fact, which are questions for a jury in a jury trial or a judge in a bench trial when acting as the factfinder. Mixed questions of law and fact are also often resolved by juries.

The judge's interpretation of the law can be debated, but if so, that is normally a matter for an appellate court to deal with, not a jury.



Of course, the distinction between questions of law and questions of fact is not exact and cannot always be cleanly separated. But at the same time, it is not like there is no distinction that can be made most of the time for practical purposes. Bottom line, it is not really the jury's job to wade into the sorts of questions that "legal scholars" worry about.



For example, suppose you have a murder case. The jury is supposed to decide if the defendant is guilty or not guilty of murder, after the judge explains to them what exactly murder is and what facts they would need to find to find the defendant guilty. On the other hand, the jury is not supposed to sit there and say, "but hey, I am reading the text of this murder statute with my fine-toothed comb, and under my interpretation it looks like murder is not a crime at all in the first place."

Juries can do that if they want in extreme circumstances and they can't be stopped if they choose to do so because of double jeopardy etc, but that is effectively jury nullification.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

How long do you think the defense will last? I'm guessing they will call Michael Avenatti as a witness.

The biggest thing the defense has going for them in this case is the likelihood that Avenatti will deliberately perjure himself in the hopes of securing a pardon from Trump if Trump wins the election.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Avenatti

Avenatti currently has about 20 years left on his federal prison sentence. He is 53 years old, so with no pardon, and if not released early, he could easily be 70+ years old by the time he is released. Effectively, that is pretty close to a life sentence for much of the rest of his remaining life, depending on how long he ends up living.

As such, he has a powerful incentive to lie if it has a chance to get his prison sentence eliminated as a result of currying favor with Trump.

Avenatti probably figures that Trump has about a 50% chance of winning.

So if Avenatti perjures himself and simply makes up a bunch of un-verifiable he-said/she-said fake conversations designed to be helpful to Trump, this could instill doubt in the jurors and lead to Trump being acquitted. Meanwhile, as long as he is careful to make his lies be impossible to disprove (by ensuring the only counter-evidence can be another person's he-said/she-said memory), it will not be possible to successfully prosecute Avenatti for perjury.

Therefore, if Trump wins, Avenatti can perjure himself and expect a full pardon from Trump as his reward, a get out of jail free card.

Meanwhile, if Biden wins, Avenatti won't serve any longer in prison than he is already sentenced to serve, because it won't be possible to convict him for perjury even if he lies, if he is careful about how exactly he lies.



This is one of the reasons why it should not be legal for Presidents to make pardons in matters that have any relation to cases against themselves personally. It is an obvious and enormous conflict of interest.