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☆ What It’s Like Inside the Courtroom at Trump’s Manhattan Criminal Trial
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-14 | by ( Jonah E. Bromwich | Charlie Smart | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Members of the public and reporters get 14 rows, seven on each side, inside the wood-paneled courtroom, behind the prosecution and defense tables. Those seats provide a view of the judge — the bench sits directly under burnished letters spelling out “In God We Trust” — and the witness stand. The jurors sit on the right side and are usually focused on the witness stand or the lawyer speaking at the lectern. Four large closed-circuit television screens also make it possible to see the faces of those at the prosecution and defense tables, including Mr. Trump. The former president usually sits in the second chair, with the defense lawyer who is handling arguments or questioning a witness occupying the first.

Persons: Donald J, “, Trump Locations: Lower Manhattan

☆ Michael Cohen Is Prosecutors’ Last Witness In Trump’s Trial. Here’s What Happens Next.
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-14 | by ( Jonah E. Bromwich | More About Jonah E. Bromwich | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Though those arguments typically bear some similarity to the opening statements that begin the trial, they tend to be even more forceful. After closing arguments, the judge will read the jurors instructions that will help them determine the verdict. A judge will typically allow deliberations to run for several days, if they must, and urge jurors to reach some kind of agreement. If they can’t, the judge would declare a mistrial — and prosecutors could bring the case again. If the jury reaches an unanimous verdict, the jurors would return to the courtroom, in this case to announce whether the former president, Mr. Trump, is guilty or not.

Persons: Trump Organizations: Prosecutors Locations: New York

Little more than two weeks into Donald J. Trump’s presidency, he and his personal lawyer met in the Oval Office for a private conversation about money. “He asked me if I needed money,” Mr. Cohen added, and volunteered that a check would be forthcoming. When monthly checks started arriving — most bearing Mr. Trump’s signature — they disguised the nature of the payments, Mr. Cohen testified. The stubs described the checks as part of a legal “retainer” agreement, but they were in fact reimbursements for hush money that Mr. Cohen had paid to silence a porn star’s story of sex with Mr. Trump. Mr. Cohen said that Mr. Trump was present when a plan to fictionalize the records was cooked up weeks earlier in New York.

Persons: Donald J, Trump’s, “, President Trump, Michael D, Cohen, ” Mr, Trump Locations: New York

☆ Live Updates: Michael Cohen, Trump’s Ex-Fixer and His Nemesis, to Testify at His Trial
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-13 | by ( Jonah E. Bromwich | Ben Protess | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +18 min

This week, however, Mr. Cohen is poised to unfix Mr. Trump’s life. And, on occasion, Mr. Cohen has said, Mr. Trump put Mr. Cohen on the phone with his wife, Melania, to reassure her that he hadn’t been unfaithful. Mr. Cohen was no longer a Trump Organization employee, and Mr. Trump had excluded him from a job in Washington. When one of Mr. Trump’s friends asked Mr. Trump why he kept Mr. Cohen so close, Mr. Trump replied, “He has his purpose.”Image In 2016, Mr. Cohen campaigned for Mr. Trump, but he did not get a job in the administration. At that meeting, Mr. Cohen has said, he and Mr. Trump confirmed their plan to falsify the records.

Persons: Michael D, Cohen, Donald J, Trump, litigators, Cohen’s, Trump’s, Stormy Daniels, Mr, lackey, ”, Jim Cole, —, Donny Deutsch, ” Mr, Deutsch, “ Donald, Trump’s “, “, ” ‘, T.J . Kirkpatrick, ” Jeffrey McConney, dryly, Roy M, Cohn, Joseph McCarthy, Rosie O’Donnell, John Taggart, Barron, Donald Trump Jr, hadn’t, Black, Karen McDougal, Daniels, Jonathan Ernst, Cohen puttered, Lanny J, Davis, doesn’t revel, Omarosa Manigault Newman, Michael, Jim Lo Scalzo, You’re, ’, Alina Habba, perjured, isn’t, Habba, Ms, “ You’re, Hope Hicks, scoffed, “ Michael Cohen Organizations: York, Prosecutors, Mr, Trump, Associated, The New York Times, Trump Organization, CNBC, Communist, National Enquirer, Playboy, Credit, Nike, “ Fox & Friends, Democratic, Federal Bureau of Prisons, White, New Locations: Manhattan, New York, Long, Trump’s New York, Trump, Miami, Moscow, Iowa, Washington, Otisville

☆ Trump vs. His Nemesis: Michael Cohen to Take the Stand Monday
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-13 | by ( Jonah E. Bromwich | Ben Protess | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

And on Monday, as Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial enters its fifth week, they will finally meet him: Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former fixer and the prosecutions’s star witness. Mr. Cohen, once Mr. Trump’s loyal attack dog and now his dedicated antagonist, will take the stand in the first criminal trial of an American president. He is expected to testify that he did so at Mr. Trump’s direction. He is also likely to say that, once Mr. Trump was in the White House, the president reimbursed him after the two met in the Oval Office in February 2017. And he will almost certainly confirm the crux of the prosecution’s case: that Mr. Trump orchestrated a plan to falsify records that disguised the reimbursement as ordinary legal expenses.

Persons: Donald J, Michael D, Cohen, Trump’s, Trump

Michael D. Cohen, the do-anything fixer who once boasted of burying Donald J. Trump’s secrets and spreading his lies, took the stand at the former president’s criminal trial in Manhattan on Monday and exposed those machinations to the jury and the world. Narrating the prosecution’s case in tell-all detail, Mr. Cohen testified that Mr. Trump in 2016 had personally directed him to pay off a porn star and had approved a dubious reimbursement plan. “Just do it,” the former fixer recalled Mr. Trump saying about the hush-money payment to the porn star, Stormy Daniels. After Mr. Trump had won the White House, Mr. Cohen demanded his money back, he said, and met with Mr. Trump, who approved monthly reimbursements. Then, the president-elect changed the subject to his new job, saying “This is going to be one heck of a ride in D.C.”

Persons: Michael D, Cohen, Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels, ” Organizations: White, Mr Locations: Manhattan

Donald J. Trump has always surrounded himself with lawyers — all types of lawyers. And then there was the singular Michael D. Cohen, lawyer by trade and enforcer by nature. With the loyalty of a surrogate son, he kept Mr. Trump’s secrets and cleaned up his messes. This week, however, Mr. Cohen is poised to unfix Mr. Trump’s life. When he takes the stand as a vital witness at Mr. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan, Mr. Cohen will unearth some of the secrets he buried, revealing a mess that prosecutors say his former boss was desperate to hide.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, litigators, Michael D, Cohen Locations: Manhattan

At Donald J. Trump’s Manhattan criminal trial, his lawyers have insisted he had “nothing to do” with any of the felony charges against him. The Manhattan district attorney says Mr. Trump orchestrated the disguise of 11 checks, 11 invoices and 12 ledger entries to continue the cover-up of a damaging story, paying his former fixer $420,000 in the process. And the testimony about Mr. Trump’s management style could play a central role as prosecutors seek to convince the jury that there is no world in which Mr. Trump was not tracking the outflow of cash from his accounts. The prosecutors’ strategy illustrates the risk of a criminal trial for Mr. Trump, one of the most famous men in the world, whose character and habits are familiar even to those who have not tracked his every move. The Manhattan district attorney’s office has accused him of orchestrating the falsification of the 34 documents to cover up a hush-money payment to a porn star, Stormy Daniels.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels Locations: Manhattan

What happened when Stormy Daniels took the stand for eight hours in the first criminal trial of former President Donald J. Trump? Jonah Bromwich, one of the lead reporters covering the trial for The Times, was in the room.

Persons: Stormy Daniels, Donald J, Trump, Jonah Bromwich Organizations: The Times

☆ Trump Trial Judge Cracks Down on Cohen’s Taunting of Ex-President
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-10 | by ( Jesse Mckinley | Jonah E. Bromwich | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In a startling precursor to what could be the most explosive testimony in Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial, the judge on Friday told prosecutors that he was personally asking that a key witness halt his statements about the former president. The witness, Michael D. Cohen, was a personal lawyer for Mr. Trump, who in 2016 paid $130,000 in hush money to a porn star to silence her account of extramarital sex with him. Mr. Cohen is expected to begin testifying next week, and has been outspoken in his taunting of Mr. Trump, including by posting a TikTok video in which he wore a shirt with a picture of the former president behind bars. On Friday, moments after prosecutors acknowledged that they have little control over their star witness, the judge, Juan M. Merchan, asked them to tell Mr. Cohen to refrain from making any more statements about the case. And he made it clear that was from the highest authority in the court: him.

Persons: Donald J, Michael D, Cohen, Trump, Juan M, Merchan, Mr Organizations: ”

Donald J. Trump, the onetime president, and Stormy Daniels, the longtime porn star, despise one another. But when Ms. Daniels returned to the witness stand at Mr. Trump’s criminal trial on Thursday, his lawyers made them sound a lot alike. During Thursday’s grueling cross-examination, Mr. Trump’s lawyers sought to discredit Ms. Daniels as a money-grubbing extortionist who used a passing proximity to Mr. Trump to attain fame and riches. But the more the defense assailed her self-promoting merchandise and online screeds, the more Ms. Daniels resembled the man she was testifying against: a master of marketing, a savant of social-media scorn. “Not unlike Mr. Trump,” she said on the stand, though unlike him, she did it without the power and platform of the presidency.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels, Daniels, Ms, grubbing, ”

An Israeli tank near the border with Gaza. The United States paused an arms shipment to Israel last week out of concern that the weapons might be used in a threatened assault on Rafah, Gaza, officials said. Credit... Tsafrir Abayov/Associated Press

Persons: Tsafrir Organizations: United, Associated Locations: Gaza, United States, Israel, Rafah

When Donald J. Trump met Stormy Daniels, their flirtation seemed fleeting: He was a 60-year-old married mogul at the peak of reality television fame, and she was 27, not half his age, a Louisiana native raised in poverty and headed to porn-film stardom. But that chance encounter in Lake Tahoe, Nev., some two decades ago set off a chain of events that has brought the nation the first criminal trial of an American president. And on Tuesday, Ms. Daniels took the stand at that trial, bringing the former president face to face with the porn star at the case’s center.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels, Daniels Locations: Louisiana, Lake Tahoe, Nev

Ms. Daniels could take the stand to testify against Mr. Trump as early as this week. Her presence would let Mr. Trump’s defense lawyers attack Ms. Daniels as an extortionist and question her credibility. Nor can she testify about the plan for Mr. Trump to hide his reimbursements to Mr. Cohen by characterizing them as legal fees. Mr. Trump’s lawyers contend that he did not know that the checks he signed for Mr. Cohen were not for legal fees, and that Mr. Cohen and Mr. Trump’s employees were responsible for any false records. “He has never thought that the little man, or especially women, and even more, women like me, matter,” Ms. Daniels said.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels, Daniels, Alvin L, Bragg, Trump’s, Michael Bachner, Bachner, Dave Sanders, Stephanie Clifford, Barrett, “ I’m, Donald Trump, ” Ms, Norm, ”, Peacock, J., r. “ Organizations: Mr, The New York Times Locations: Manhattan, New York City, Baton Rouge, La, Texas, Florida, New York

Prosecutors cannot force Donald J. Trump to testify at his criminal trial in Manhattan, but that does not mean they can’t use his words against him. On Tuesday, the prosecutors unearthed a series of damaging excerpts from books that the former president wrote, plucking out passages to help make their case against Mr. Trump. In essence, they called a past version of Mr. Trump to testify against his future self. In his own words, Mr. Trump described how he kept a focus on minute details and watched every penny that left his accounts, corroborating a core component of the prosecution’s case as they argue that he knew that his company falsified business records to cover up a hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels, a porn star. On cross-examination, Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, suggested that a ghost writer had been responsible for these words.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Stormy Daniels, Trump’s, Todd Blanche Locations: Manhattan

Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan has reached the third week of testimony, and there are only a few key witnesses who have yet to take the stand. There is Michael D. Cohen, the Trump fixer who made that payment and is expected to be crucial for the prosecution. And there are several employees of the Trump family business, who helped the then-president reimburse Mr. Cohen. The exact order of witnesses is unclear, but the trial is zipping along and the prosecution could wrap up in little more than two weeks. Ms. Daniels could testify as soon as this week, bringing her face to face with Mr. Trump, who for years has attacked her.

Persons: Donald J, Stormy Daniels, Trump, Michael D, Cohen, Daniels Organizations: Trump fixer Locations: Manhattan

After the judge rebuked Mr. Trump for violating a gag order and mounting “a direct attack on the rule of law,” the prosecutors provided jurors with their first look at the 34 records they say he falsified to cover up an infamous payment. Mr. Trump made the payment to his longtime fixer, Michael D. Cohen, reimbursing him for a $130,000 hush-money payoff to a porn star, Stormy Daniels, prosecutors say. Before Mr. Trump repaid Mr. Cohen, prosecutors say, he orchestrated a scheme to falsify the records. Mr. Trump, the first American president to face prosecution, is on trial for 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, one for each document: 11 checks to Mr. Cohen, 11 invoices from Mr. Cohen and 12 entries in Mr. Trump’s general ledger. The invoices and ledger entries claimed that Mr. Cohen had been repaid for “legal expenses” that arose from a “retainer agreement.”

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Mr, Michael D, Cohen, reimbursing, Stormy Daniels, ”

The judge overseeing Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan rebuked the former president on Monday for mounting “a direct attack on the rule of law,” holding him in contempt of court for a second time and threatening to jail him if he continued to break a gag order that bars him from attacking jurors. In a moment of remarkable courtroom drama, the judge, Juan M. Merchan, addressed Mr. Trump personally from the bench, saying that if there were further violations, he might bypass financial penalties and place the former president behind bars. Justice Merchan acknowledged that jailing Mr. Trump was “the last thing” he wanted to do, but explained that it was his responsibility to “protect the dignity of the justice system.”The judge said that he understood “the magnitude of such a decision” and that jailing Mr. Trump would be a last resort. He noted: “You are the former president of the United States, and possibly the next president as well.”

Persons: Donald J, ”, Juan M, Merchan, Trump, Justice Merchan Locations: Manhattan, United States

☆ Live Updates: Trump’s Criminal Trial Speeds Along, With Few Key Witnesses Remaining
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-06 | by ( Ben Protess | Jonah E. Bromwich | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +6 min

The Manhattan district attorney has charged Mr. Trump, 77, with falsifying 34 business records to hide a $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, a porn star who says she and Mr. Trump had a tryst in 2006 while he was married. Mr. Trump, the first American president to face criminal prosecution, has denied the charges and says he did not have sex with Ms. Daniels. Here are five takeaways from Mr. Trump’s 11th day, and third week, on trial:A scandalous recording resurfaces. Ms. Hicks recalled consulting with Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, who eventually paid Ms. Daniels to keep quiet. On Thursday, prosecutors presented four more incidents and called Mr. Trump’s statements “corrosive.” Mr. Trump’s legal team argued that he was merely responding to political attacks.

Persons: Hope Hicks, Donald J, Trump, Gasps, Trump’s, Hicks, Stormy Daniels, Daniels, Ivanka, Donald Trump’s, Billy Bush, Mark Makela, Juan M, ” Mr, “, Karen McDougal, McDougal, Michael D, Cohen, —, Keith Davidson, Hillary Clinton, Davidson, Mr, Doug Mills, Clinton, ”, Justice Merchan, Merchan Organizations: White, White House, The Washington Post, ”, The New York, The, Wall Street, The National Enquirer, Trump, Manhattan Criminal, New York Times, Prosecutors, Mr Locations: Manhattan, Los Angeles

Donald J. Trump is on trial for 34 felony counts of what could be the dullest sounding crime in New York’s penal code: falsifying business records. Yet, across nine witnesses and two weeks of testimony, jurors have been treated to hours of mesmerizing courtroom theater. There was talk of a sex scandal with a porn star, a surreptitious recording of a future president and the tearful testimony of a former confidante in the glare of the witness stand. There was even a celebrity roll call: Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan and the reality television star Tila Tequila were all name-checked this week, drawing chuckles in the Lower Manhattan courtroom. The phrase “falsifying business records,” however, was not uttered to the jury during testimony.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan, Tila Tequila Locations: Lower Manhattan

“I’m really nervous,” Hope Hicks, the onetime Trump spokeswoman, messaging maestro and all-around adviser, acknowledged to the prosecutor questioning her, declaring what was already obvious to the riveted courtroom. Ms. Hicks’s unease came to a head hours later as Mr. Trump’s lawyer began to cross-examine her — and she began to cry. Mr. Trump locked his eyes on her. The question that initially unnerved Ms. Hicks was about her time at the Trump Organization, the family’s business, where she had fond memories of working. Ms. Hicks left the stand, and the trial paused so that she could compose herself.

Persons: Donald J, Trump, “, ” Hope Hicks, Trump’s, Ms, Hicks Organizations: Trump, Trump Organization

“You did everything you could to get as close to that line as possible without crossing it, right?” Mr. Bove said. “I did everything I could to make sure that my activities were lawful,” Mr. Davidson replied. Mr. Davidson, who had a niche practice representing people with often salacious claims against celebrities, began the day by describing his unpleasant relationship with Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former fixer and personal lawyer, who ultimately paid Ms. Daniels to keep silent. Mr. Trump is charged with 34 felonies for what prosecutors say were his attempts from the White House to disguise reimbursements to Mr. Cohen. The testimony from Mr. Davidson on Thursday, his second day on the stand, painted a vivid portrait of fevered efforts by the witness, Mr. Cohen and others to keep allegations of extramarital affairs by Mr. Trump out of the public eye.

Persons: Bove, “, Mr, Davidson, Trump, Michael D, Cohen, Trump’s, Daniels, reimbursements

Rumors that the Hollywood star Lindsay Lohan was in rehab. A lawsuit by Hulk Hogan, the former pro wrestler, against the gossip website Gawker for publishing a tape of him having sex. Testimony on Thursday at former President Donald J. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan dove deeply into the celebrity-obsessed digital media environment of the past fifteen years or so that helped fuel Mr. Trump’s rise to political prominence. In his testimony, particularly as he was cross-examined, Mr. Davidson and a defense lawyer, Emil Bove, together led the jurors on a whirlwind tour of several gossipy and tawdry deals he had a hand in. Prosecutors say that the former president’s efforts to continue to keep the story hidden were criminal.

Persons: Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan, Hulk Hogan, Donald J, Keith Davidson, Davidson, Emil Bove, Karen McDougal, Stormy Daniels, Trump, Michael D, Cohen Organizations: Hollywood, Prosecutors Locations: Manhattan, Los Angeles

It might seem strange that prosecutors from the Manhattan district attorney’s office are eliciting such testimony about their central witness, especially given that the defense has already begun attacking Mr. Cohen’s credibility. Mr. Cohen, who pleaded guilty to federal crimes in 2018, was often belligerent as he did Mr. Trump’s bidding. It appears that the district attorney’s office will seek to turn that to their advantage: So far, they’ve drawn smiles and chuckles from jurors when asking witnesses to discuss Mr. Cohen. “I didn’t want to receive a million frustrating phone calls from Michael,” said the lawyer, Keith Davidson, who in 2016 represented a porn star, Stormy Daniels, who received the hush money. Prosecutors have accused the former president of falsifying business records to cover up the hush money deal and charged him with 34 felonies.

Persons: Cohen, they’ve, “, Michael, ”, Keith Davidson, Stormy Daniels, Daniels, Trump Organizations: Prosecutors Locations: Manhattan

covers criminal justice in New York, with a focus on the Manhattan district attorney’s office and state criminal courts in Manhattan.

Locations: New York, Manhattan

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