Lydia Hu inside court: Jury instruction makes key Cohen testimony 'very important'
Merchan instructed jury on knowledge of a conspiracy. He said, mere knowledge of a conspiracy does not make defendant a co-conspirator. Prosecutors must prove intent. Also, being present with others when they form a conspiracy does not mean that the defendant is a part of the conspiracy.
This instruction makes the Cohen’s testimony about calling Trump to advise of Stormy NDA issues, including the phone call to Schiller/Trump in Oct 2016, very important. If juror believes Cohen was advising Trump specifically of the NDA, getting approval and “sign off” from Trump to set up the bank account and LLC, the juror could maybe find intent on behalf of Trump.
Otherwise, evidence shows Trump was present at the 2015 Trump tower meeting with Pecker and Cohen when Pecker says he would be “eyes and ears” and Trump was a part of the TT meeting with Allen Weisselberg and Cohen as they talked about the $420,000 payments; in both cases, perhaps a juror could conclude Trump was present without taking action, so had no intent.
This illustrates why Blanche made a big production in court to cast doubt on Cohen’s version of the October 2016 call, that perhaps it was about prank calls not about Stormy at all. If he’s lying about that phone call, is he lying about them all?
-- Lydia Hu, Fox Business Network correspondent
Posted by Brianna Herlihy
2 min(s) ago
Jonathan Turley inside the court: Resurrecting dead misdemeanor 'so circular as to produce vertigo'
So a dead misdemeanor for falsifying business records was zapped back into life by alleging that under NY election law 17-152 it was done to influence the election by the unlawful means of falsification of business records. It is so circular as to produce vertigo. So the jury finds some documents were falsified to use the unlawful means of falsifying other documents. That is only one of three possible crimes and the jury does not have to agree on which was the basis for their conviction.
-- Jonathan Turley, constitutional law attorney and FNC contributor
Posted by Michael Lee
5 min(s) ago
Cohen’s guilty plea is ‘inadmissible evidence’ against Trump: Andy McCarthy
Fox News contributor Andy McCarthy joins ‘America’s Newsroom’ with analysis on the N.Y. v. Trump trial ahead of jury deliberations.
Posted by Michael Lee
10 min(s) ago
Jonathan Turley inside court: Absence of a witness on media practices 'more and more significant'
The absence of a witness on media practices is becoming more and more significant. Such a witness could have discussed how stories are often killed or planted by campaigns in light of the press exception for common practices by the media. Instead, the prosecutor was allowed to state as a fact what the common practices of the media are in a campaign.
-- Jonathan Turley, constitutional law attorney and FNC contributor
Posted by Brianna Herlihy
