Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case against former President Donald Trump has taken many turns lately. Earlier this month, Trump was arraigned on federal charges related to his handling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida
As such, Bragg’s case against Trump is now likely adjourned as the federal case takes precedence. However, longtime defense lawyer and litigator, Alan Dershowitz, is still sounding the alarm bells regarding Bragg’s office attempting to “keep secret” certain aspects of his case against Trump.
“District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s rebuff of President Trump’s request for a bill of particulars — a record that would provide a high-resolution snapshot of the case against him — telegraphs that the Manhattan prosecutor is mostly keeping his cards close to the vest in what could be the trial of the century,” the New York Sun reported.
“The disclosure of the full nature of the charges against Mr. Trump is a flashpoint because of how Mr. Bragg has built his criminal case, which stems from hush money payments to an adult film star, Stormy Daniels. Convicting Mr. Trump would require linking the falsification of business records, a misdemeanor on its own, to a second crime,” the outlet added.
Speaking to the NY Sun, Dershowitz, asked: “How do you put on a defense if you don’t know the crime?”
Dershowitz said he’s “never seen a weaker indictment” than the one handed up by Bragg against Trump, in part because there has “never been a case in American history where anybody has been indicted for failing to disclose hush money about an alleged illicit affair.”
The famed attorney added that there is an “absolute constitutional right” for a defendant to learn the nature of the charges against him, “a protection rooted in the Constitution’s Sixth Amendment with the promise that a defendant is entitled to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation” and to “be confronted with the witnesses against him.”
Bragg is facing some legal trouble himself and is facing a pair of lawsuits related to his filing of charges against Trump, accusing him of illegalities involving a hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election facilitated by his then-personal attorney Michael Cohen.
Fox News notes: “The Heritage Foundation, a Washing ton, D.C.-based conservative think tank, has sued Bragg under suspicions that he and his office coordinated or communicated with the Justice Department, the White House, and Rep. Daniel Goldman, D-N.Y., about the prosecution. In its lawsuit, Heritage claims that such actions eventually led to investigations by several U.S. House committees into Bragg’s conduct.”
In May, Dershowitz said he believed Bragg could be disbarred for his case against Trump.
Dershowitz told DW’s Tim Sebastian that while he does not support Trump politically, he does believe the indictment brought by Bragg against the former Trump is “absurd and politically motivated.”
Dershowitz argued that Trump will not get a “fair trial in Manhattan” given the judges and prosecutors are elected, meaning those in New York all likely lean to the Left politically.
Dershowitz went on to argue that things could potentially get difficult for Bragg if he uses former Trump attorney Michael Cohen as a witness at the trial, which is scheduled to begin in December.
“I don’t think an indictment can actually come forward now after the comments made by [Robert] Costello,” the attorney said
He said that “he has proved that the main witness is going to be a perjuring liar on the witness stand, and that puts the district attorney in a terrible position.”
“If he uses Cohen as a witness, he could actually lose his bar license. It’s unethical to put a witness on the stand who you know is lying, and he has to know that Cohen will be lying. Or he tries the case without Cohen, which would be very difficult, or he does the right thing: he drops the case,” Dershowitz said.
Dershowitz also argued in a prior interview that Bragg could face up to five years in prison if he is found guilty of leaking details of Trump’s indictment to the media.
Leaking grand jury testimony to the public is a Class E felony in New York and carries a prison sentence between one and five years.
Dershowitz also wrote in an op-ed that whoever leaked the sealed indictment is the person guilty of the only felony, in his opinion, in this case.
“It is likely that a serious felony has been committed right under District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s nose and he is not investigating it. Under New York law, it is a felony to leak confidential grand jury information, such as whether the jurors voted to indict. The protection of secrecy is as applicable to President Trump as it is to anyone else,” Dershowitz said.