#obstruction of justice

[reasonsforhope]

HOLY SHIT THEY DID IT

TRUMP HAS BEEN CHARGED WITH SEVEN COUNTS OF FEDERAL CRIMES

"Donald Trump said Thursday [June 8th] that he has been indicted on charges of mishandling classified documents at his Florida estate, igniting a federal prosecution that is arguably the most perilous of multiple legal threats against the former president as he seeks to reclaim the White House.

The Justice Department did not immediately publicly confirm the indictment. But two people familiar with the situation who were not authorized to discuss it publicly said that the indictment included seven criminal counts...

The indictment enmeshes the Justice Department in the most politically explosive prosecution in its long history. Its first case against a former president upends a Republican presidential primary that Trump is currently dominating, and any felony charges would raise the prospect of a yearslong prison sentence...

The indictment arises from a monthslong investigation by special counsel Jack Smith into whether Trump broke the law by holding onto hundreds of documents marked classified at his Palm Beach property, Mar-a-Lago, and whether Trump took steps to obstruct the government’s efforts to recover the records.

Prosecutors have said that Trump took roughly 300 classified documents to Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House, including some 100 that were seized by the FBI last August in a search of the home that underscored the gravity of the Justice Department’s investigation...

The investigation had simmered for months before bursting into front-page news in remarkable fashion last August. That’s when FBI agents served a search warrant on Mar-a-Lago and removed 33 boxes containing classified records, including top-secret documents stashed in a storage room and desk drawer and commingled with personal belongings. Some records were so sensitive that investigators needed upgraded security clearances to review them, the Justice Department has said."

-via WTOP News, June 8, 2023

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Two Alberta lawyers charged with attempting to obstruct justice have been banned from practising law anywhere in Canada for three years as part of a plea deal with Manitoba prosecutors that saw their charges stayed.

Randal Jay Cameron and John Carpay were also charged with intimidation of a justice system participant after they hired a private investigator to follow the Manitoba judge who presided over their case challenging COVID-19 restrictions in 2021.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[jonostroveart]

Primecrime

I find this jackass Jesse Watters even harder to look at than Tucker Carlson. His smirk may not be quite as asinine as Tucker’s, but I find it somehow even more annoying and he strikes me as even more performative than Tucker, if that’s possible. TrumpTrial

[nodynasty4us]

From the July 27, 2023 article:

The charges include “willful retention of national defense information and two new obstruction counts based on allegations the ex-president and a pair of aides attempted to delete surveillance footage at the private Mar-a-Lago club in the summer of 2022,” The Messenger reports.

“Thursday’s developments also include the addition of a second co-defendant alongside Trump and his valet, Walt Nauta. Carlos De Oliveira, a Mar-a-Lago maintenance worker, was added to the original indictment against Trump and Nauta and now charges him with obstruction conspiracy tied to the surveillance footage.”

[whatareyoureallyafraidof]

  By complaining the FBI took the documents out of boxes to put them on the floor to take this picture, this idiot just confessed to having the documents he claimed he didn’t have. Sad! Your Honor; the People rest.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Former President Donald Trump and two of his aides were hit with new charges in the Mar-a-Lago documents case on Thursday.

A grand jury in South Florida returned a superseding indictment adding four charges to the prior indictment against Trump and aide Walt Nauta. Another aide, Carlos De Oliveira, the Mar-a-Lago head of maintenance, was also added to the obstruction conspiracy charged in the original indictment.

The indictment alleges that De Oliveira told another employee that "the boss" wanted the server with Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage deleted and asked how long the footage was stored.

"What are we going to do?" he allegedly said.

The alleged exchange came after Trump's team received a subpoena for the security footage, according to the indictment.

The new indictment charges Trump with two new obstruction counts and with allegedly possessing the classified document he was heard discussing in an audio recording of a meeting at his Bedminster, N.J. golf club. Trump in the audio bragged that he had a classified Iran war plan that he could not show others because he hadn't declassified it. He has since denied that he was in possession of the document.

But the new indictment alleges that he did have it and that it was marked "TOP SECRET" and involved a "Presentation concerning military activity in a foreign country."

Trump and Nauta pleaded not guilty to the earlier charges against them.

National security attorney Mark Zaid said the indictment "reads like organized crime activity," citing the "compelling" text messages and video footage cited in the document.

Former Manhattan prosecutor Karen Friedman Agnifilo told CNN that the indictment "reads like a spy novel."

"That's what you would do. You would try to… wipe out the video footage," she said. "I mean, it's just astonishing that this is what Trump wanted to do! He wanted to destroy evidence of a crime! I mean, that's really what this is."

CNN legal analyst Elliot Williams said that the timeline laid out by the indictment is "devastating."

"They start communicating about what the boss' wishes are and immediately took steps to delete this footage," he said Friday. "All of that is pretty lock, stock and barrel evidence of obstruction of justice."

Fellow CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig argued that the charge related to the Iran document was the "single most important" part of the indictment.

"Those papers he was shuffling, yes, they were classified documents, they're related to war plans, and DOJ has that document. That is now a new charge in this indictment," he said.

"And that makes that incident so much worse than just Donald Trump exaggerating or bragging or bluffing, as he has suggested," Honig added. "This means he actually had that classified document in his possession. He was showing it to others, he was bragging about it, he was disseminating it, to use the legalistic word."

But some legal experts also warned that the new charges could delay the trial in the case.

Defense attorney Ken White told Insider that adding De Oliveira was a "big change" that could "delay things a couple of months."

"I think it's an appropriate move," adding that considerations about the election timeline is "not a legitimate line of inquiry for a prosecutor."

"One thing is clear from today's superseding indictment — Jack Smith is more concerned about making the best possible case he can against Donald Trump than he is about rushing to the finish line," tweeted former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti. "Adding another defendant can slow things down, but it also strengthens his hand."

[makingdonalddrumpfagain]

[randyite]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

[The Daily Don]

* * * *

[from “Today’s Edition”]

New details strongly support criminal exposure for Trump in Mar-a-Lago documents case.

         The media is being flooded with “exclusive” tips about Trump's impending indictment in the Mar-a-Lago documents case. The source of the leaks may be Trump and his advisors, who routinely leak bad news in advance of public disclosures to take the sting out of the negative developments. On Thursday, Bloomberg News reported that

Special Counsel Jack Smith is wrapping up his investigation into former president Donald Trump’s refusal to return classified documents after his election defeat and is poised to announce possible criminal charges in the days or weeks after Memorial Day, according to people familiar with the matter.

         That revelation is consistent with the ham-fisted letter Trump sent to Merrick Garland earlier in the week demanding a meeting to discuss the investigation by Jack Smith. Such meetings are routine before indictments issue. So, there is a good chance Trump has been told he will be indicted soon and has been given the opportunity to dissuade Jack Smith from seeking an indictment.

         But revelations today in the Washington Post suggest that Jack Smith has a strong case against Trump for unlawfully retaining national defense documents and obstruction of justice. The Post reported that Trump employees moved classified documents out of a storage room after receiving a grand jury subpoena and then moved them back into the same storage room a day before telling the FBI it could view the documents. See WaPo, Trump workers moved Mar-a-Lago boxes a day before FBI came for documents. (This article is accessible to everyone.)

         The implication of the Post story is this: Trump took boxes of documents out of the storage room after receiving the subpoena, selectively removed documents, and then returned the boxes to the storage room to deceive the FBI about what documents Trump had in his possession. That inference is supported by the fact that when the FBI later obtained a search warrant, it found approximately 100 classified documents remaining at Mar-a-Lago.

         Separately, the NYTimes reported on disclosures from a sealed order by Judge Beryl Howell, who ruled on the DOJ’s claim that communications by Trump's attorneys fell within the crime-fraud exception to privilege (and could therefore by reviewed by the DOJ). See NYTimes, Mar-a-Lago Worker Provided Prosecutors New Details in Trump Documents Case. It appears that an anonymous source read the sealed order to a reporter for the NYTimes.

         Judge Howell’s order stated:

The government has proffered sufficient evidence that the former president possessed tangible documents containing national defense information [and] failed to deliver those documents to an officer entitled to receive them.

Notably, no excuse is provided as to how the former president could miss the classified-marked documents found in his own bedroom at Mar-a-Lago.

Other evidence demonstrates that the former president willfully sought to retain classified documents when he was not authorized to do so, and knew it.

         To recap: Trump reviewed the documents in his possession; selectively retained some of them; arranged for his lawyers to falsely tell the FBI that all documents had been returned; and when the FBI (and a private security firm) later searched Mar-a-Lago, classified documents were found in his desk and bedroom. There is no credible, innocent explanation for those facts.

         If Jack Smith secures an indictment of Trump in the next few weeks for espionage and obstruction of justice, Trump will again lose control over his fate—as he has in the Manhattan trial over his hush-money payments. Most importantly, the DOJ will protect the rule of law and the Constitution, both of which Trump has attacked and mocked.

         An indictment for espionage and obstruction of justice will be significant and historically important. The indictment should be welcomed by all Americans whose faith in our system of justice has been undermined by Trump's apparent ability to evade accountability. But it is not enough.

         Trump attempted to prevent the peaceful transfer of power as commanded by the Constitution and the will of the people. Indicting Trump for espionage is appropriate. Indicting Trump for attempting a coup is necessary.

[Robert B. Hubbell]

[ideaventurehub]

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[stuff-by-parm]

No Less

Equal justice under the law? TBD…

More Mo & Mo comics at disentangledweb.com

[jonostroveart]

Motherplucker

[nodynasty4us]

From the December 27, 2023 article:

Comer and Jordan wrote that a statement from [White House press secretary Karine] Jean-Pierre indicated that “President Biden was aware in advance that his son, Hunter Biden, would knowingly defy two congressional subpoenas,” compelling them “to examine as part of our impeachment inquiry whether the President engaged in a conspiracy to obstruct a proceeding of Congress.”

...

“In light of this evidence, the fact that the President had advanced awareness that Mr. Biden would defy the Committees’ subpoenas raises a troubling new question that we must examine: whether the President corruptly sought to influence or obstruct the Committees’ proceeding by preventing, discouraging, or dissuading his son from complying with the Committees’ subpoenas,” the letter said. “Such conduct could constitute an impeachable offense.”

[speedygal]

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

A three-judge panel of the District Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals has denied former President Trump’s request to block one of his attorneys from turning over documents to a grand jury looking into whether he broke the law by retaining classified documents at his Florida residence and whether he obstructed the investigation into his alleged retention of the documents.

Circuit Judges Nina Pillard, J. Michelle Childs and Florence Pan issued a brief order lifting an administrative stay of a lower court order compelling attorney Evan Corcoran to turn over documents – including recordings of Mr. Trump – to a grand jury working under the supervision of Justice Department Special Counsel Jack Smith.

The panel ordered Mr. Corcoran to comply with the 17 March order from District Judge Beryl Howell, who until last week was Chief Judge of the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

Judge Howell reportedly found that Mr. Smith, who had asked for an order compelling Mr. Corcoran’s testimony, had met the burden to show Mr. Trump had used the attorney’s legal advice in the commission of a crime.

Known as the “crime-fraud exception” to attorney-client privilege, the exception allows Mr. Smith to compel Mr. Corcoran to testify and produce documents that would ordinarily be shielded by the privilege, which generally guards communications between an attorney and a client.

The ruling means Mr. Corcoran will have to provide the grand jury evidence that could be used to indict Mr. Trump on charges that he obstructed a DOJ investigation into whether he unlawfully retained classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago beach club for more than a year after his term as President ended in January 2021.