Trump legal professionals allege juror misconduct in New York legal case
President-elect Donald Trump fired one other salvo in his long-running effort to have his New York legal conviction tossed, together with his attorneys alleging earlier this month that there was juror misconduct throughout his trial.
In a beforehand undisclosed Dec. 3 letter to Justice Juan Merchan that was made public Tuesday, Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote that there was “grave juror misconduct” within the proceedings in a Manhattan courtroom earlier this 12 months.
Nonetheless, heavy redactions within the letter and subsequent exchanges with prosecutors obscured virtually all details about the accusations themselves.
“The jury on this case was not wherever close to truthful and neutral,” they wrote.
Merchan on Tuesday directed Trump to make the redacted letter public, and instructed prosecutors to publish their very own redacted responses. The decide additionally criticized Trump’s legal professionals for making such severe allegations with out sworn statements.
Prosecutors referred to as the allegations “imprecise accusations of juror misconduct” in one in every of their responses. They claimed Trump’s attorneys didn’t wish to have the allegations topic to investigation or a public listening to.
“However the import of their allegations, counsel don’t request and in reality oppose a listening to at which their allegations could possibly be absolutely examined, referring to such a listening to as ‘invasive fact-finding,'” wrote a prosecutor for Manhattan District Lawyer Alvin Bragg.
Nonetheless, they argued such an investigation wasn’t but acceptable.
“Counsel’s allegations fall far in need of the usual required to request such a listening to in any occasion,” they wrote.
It’s unclear if the allegations relate to a June 7 letter from Merchan that alerted prosecutors and Trump’s attorneys to a remark left on the court docket’s Fb web page the evening earlier than Trump’s conviction.
“My cousin is a juror and says Trump is getting convicted,” the consumer wrote. “Thanks of us for all of your laborious work!!!!”
The one who made the remark had beforehand described themselves as a “skilled s**tposter.”
Trump was discovered responsible in Might of 34 counts of falsifying enterprise information, related with a scheme to cowl up a “hush cash” cost to an grownup movie star. He pleaded not responsible and is contesting the conviction on a number of fronts.
