Location of Manhattan Hearing on Motion to Keep Cohen Documents From Being Reviewed
Approximate Suggests Review of Cohen Documents Is Moving Also Slowly
A federal judge in Manhattan on Wednesday ordered lawyers for Michael D. Cohen, President Trump'due south longtime logroller, to complete within just over two weeks their review of a huge trove of documents and data that the F.B.I. seized from Mr. Cohen concluding month and that prosecutors are eager to apply in their standing investigation of him.
The judge, Kimba M. Woods, said that if the lawyers did non see her June fifteen deadline, she would permit the government to have control of the review, which is seeking to determine whether any of the seized paperwork or electronic files should exist protected under the lawyer-client privilege.
A court-appointed special master has been overseeing scrutiny of the materials with Mr. Cohen's lawyers, just Guess Wood suggested in a hearing in The states District Court that the process was moving as well slowly.
"It is of import for the court to residuum the slow, deliberate needs of those who are asserting attorney-customer privilege," Judge Wood said, "with the need for an investigation to become forward."
On Tuesday, the special master, Barbara S. Jones, reported to the judge that more than one million items from 3 of Mr. Cohen'due south cellphones would be turned over to the government on Wed later on lawyers for Mr. Cohen and Mr. Trump determined that they contained no privileged information. About 300,000 additional files were turned over to prosecutors last week.
Amid the items non yet cleared for release, a prosecutor said in court on Wednesday, were the contents of two BlackBerry phones and of one of Mr. Cohen's shredders. Boxes of documents, about a dozen cellphones, iPads and computers, and 19 hard drives and thumb drives were seized on April 9 when federal agents raided Mr. Cohen's part, apartment and hotel room.
For months at present, the authorities take been investigating whether Mr. Cohen violated the constabulary in his wide-ranging business organization deals, including hush-money payments that he made to women who claimed they had affairs with Mr. Trump — among them Stephanie Clifford, a former pornographic film star ameliorate known as Stormy Daniels. No criminal charges have been filed.
Before Approximate Forest set her deadline for the cease of the review, Todd Harrison, one of Mr. Cohen'due south lawyers, had asked for more time, noting that 15 lawyers at his firm and two data specialists were already working night and twenty-four hour period to consummate the chore. "We are moving heaven and earth," Mr. Harrison said. He added that members of his team were working weekends and sleeping on couches in the role.
The United States attorney's role in Manhattan had sought to conduct the review itself, using what is known every bit a taint team, a group of prosecutors walled off from those treatment the Cohen investigation.
Approximate Wood fabricated it clear on Wednesday that if Mr. Cohen'south lawyers did non motion quicker, she would wrest control of the review from them and let a taint squad sort through the documents that they had not finished considering.
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transcript
transcript
Michael Cohen: How Trump'south 'Pit Bull' Turned on Him
Michael D. Cohen, President Trump'south onetime lawyer, has pleaded guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws and has implicated Mr. Trump. Here is how their relationship has evolved.
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Michael Cohen, President Trump'due south old personal lawyer, went from this: "I'll do anything to protect Mr. Trump." "They say I'yard Mr. Trump's pit bull." "I've stood by him, shoulder to shoulder." To this: "Shock waves after President Trump's former attorney Michael Cohen ..." "Michael Cohen, pleading guilty and implicating the president ..." "... possibly the worst day in Donald Trump'due south presidency thus far." So why did one of Trump's most trusted advisers flip? Cohen was known for beingness Trump's fixer and biggest defender. "If there's an event that relates to Mr. Trump that is of business organisation to him, information technology's of course of concern to me. And I will use my legal skills within which to protect Mr. Trump to the best of my power." In Apr, the F.B.I. raided Cohen's role after he became a target in special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. Trump was quick to come to Cohen's defense. But once the investigation zeroed in on Cohen, the lawyer began to change his melody. "My wife, my daughter and my son accept my beginning loyalty and e'er will. I put family and country first." In July, Cohen released audio from a conversation with Donald Trump that he secretly recorded two months before the 2016 ballot. The two appear to be discussing payments to a erstwhile Playboy model who said she had an matter with Trump. [Cohen and Trump speaking] Hither's when things between Trump and Cohen began to publicly fall autonomously. "I expected something like this from Cohen, he's been lying all week. I mean, for two — he's been lying for years. There'due south nobody that I know that knows him that hasn't warned me that if his back is up against the wall, he will lie like crazy, because he's lied all his life." On Aug. 21, Cohen pleaded guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws and said President Trump directed him to brand payments to two women during the 2016 campaign to avoid a potential sex scandal. Cohen'due south lawyer suggested he knew more. "Mr. Cohen has knowledge on certain subjects that should exist of involvement to the special counsel and is more than happy to tell the special counsel all that he knows." Trump tried to play down the momentous admission via Twitter.
At one point in the hearing, these highly technical discussions about the document review were overtaken by the seemingly endless — and increasingly bitter — legal grudge lucifer betwixt another of Mr. Cohen's lawyers, Stephen One thousand. Ryan, and Ms. Clifford'southward lawyer, Michael Avenatti.
Mr. Avenatti has for weeks been trying to formally enter the case to protect any records related to Ms. Clifford that were swept upward in the raids on Mr. Cohen. But he has as well been waging a guerrilla-fashion publicity campaign against Mr. Trump, Mr. Cohen and other members of the Trump legal squad, attacking them relentlessly on social media and in round-the-clock television receiver appearances.
Though lawyers rarely object to an adversary'south try to appear in court, Mr. Ryan told Gauge Woods on Wednesday that Mr. Avenatti should non be allowed to enter the case, citing his "reckless" and "improper" behavior — and his 170 recent TV interviews (74 of them, he noted, on CNN alone.)
"He is involved in ways that call attending to himself," Mr. Ryan said, adding, "This is most the aggrandizement of a single chaser and his client."
Mr. Ryan seemed particularly incensed about a report — plainly based on private depository financial institution records — that Mr. Avenatti released this month showing that a shell company owned by Mr. Cohen had received millions of dollars from a firm linked to a Russian oligarch and from major corporations like AT&T and the drug maker Novartis. Mr. Ryan said that the release of the material, which created a media frenzy, was "intentional, malicious and prejudicial."
"It was a premeditated drive-by shooting of my customer's rights," Mr. Ryan said.
Joanna C. Hendon, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, told Judge Woods that she agreed with Mr. Ryan that Mr. Avenatti should be kept out of the case. To bolster her statement, Ms. Hendon noted that a estimate in California had recently issued a $ten meg judgment against Mr. Avenatti's police firm and that, equally proof of Mr. Avenatti's insatiable hunger for attending, a podium with microphones fastened to it was already pending him outside the courthouse.
When Mr. Avenatti rose to accost Approximate Wood, he suggested it was odd that Ms. Hendon had attacked him for undergoing bankruptcy or for using the media as a platform, given that her customer, Mr. Trump, was known for doing both. "The irony of that, your honor, is rather palpable," he said.
Though Estimate Forest did not immediately dominion on Mr. Avenatti's request to intervene in the case, she did warn him that if he were admitted, he would have to cease releasing private materials and finish his "publicity tour," which she said could taint potential jurors.
"This conduct is inimicable to giving Mr. Cohen eventually a fair trial," Judge Wood said. She added, "You will not be permitted to use this court as a platform."
Minutes after the hearing concluded, Mr. Avenatti temporarily withdrew his asking to announced in the instance as an out-of-state lawyer based in California, simply reserved his right to renew it at any time. He likewise agreed to put on pause his movement to intervene as he waits to see if the certificate review turns upward any materials related to Ms. Clifford.
It seemed, if anything, similar a strategic retreat, allowing him to continue in his role as a media gadfly while keeping his legal options open.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/30/nyregion/trump-michael-cohen-stormy-daniels.html
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