Michael Cohen’s former lawyer Robert Costello returned to the witness stand Tuesday morning to testify for the defense in the New York criminal trial against Donald Trump. live update From the court.
On Monday, Costello was called as the defense’s second witness. The lawyer clashed with Judge Juan Merchan, expressing frustration with the judge’s decision to uphold several prosecution objections during his testimony. blaze news report.
Marchan briefly left the courtroom after Costello rolled his eyes, sighed and called it “ridiculous.”
“You don’t look at me sideways or roll your eyes. … When you have a witness on the stand and you don’t like my verdict, you don’t say, ‘Wow.’ ‘Strike me.’ I don’t say that,” Marchand told Costello.
“Judge Marchand had so limited my testimony that the defense decided not to call me.”
During direct examination of Costello by Trump’s lawyers on Monday, Costello testified that Cohen told him the former president had nothing to do with the $130,000 settlement he made with porn actress Stormy Daniels. Costello argued that Cohen paid him himself to regain Trump’s favor and improve his chances of securing a position in the White House.
Costello said Cohen told him about 10 to 12 times during their April 2018 meeting, “I swear to God, Bob, I don’t have anything on Donald Trump.”
During cross-examination of Costello on Tuesday, prosecutors tried to allege that Costello harbored “enmity” toward Cohen. Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger asked whether Costello tried to pressure Cohen to hire him as his lawyer so he could provide a back door to Trump through Rudolph Giuliani. Costello denied the allegations.
Mr. Hoffinger then showed Mr. Costello an email he sent to Mr. Cohen that allegedly referred to backchannels.
“The email speaks for itself, right?” Hoffinger asked.
“No, that’s not true. There’s a reason for that email and I’d be happy to discuss it with you,” Costello replied.
“That’s fine, let’s move on to the next topic,” Hoffinger said.
Prosecutors also accused Costello of trying to “blackmail” Cohen by providing information such as: last week’s testimony before a House committee.
“That’s ridiculous, no,” Costello said.
After Costello finished testifying Tuesday, Marchan instructed jurors on timing.
“I have considered all the changes… At the end of the day, I think the best thing we can do is adjourn from now until next Tuesday, at which time we will hear the total amount from our lawyers.” “Maybe on Wednesday I’ll ask you to come…after we hear the jury’s censure, we’ll hopefully begin deliberations at some point on Wednesday,” Marchand concluded. .
anything else?
On Monday, the defense asked former Federal Election Commissioner Brad Smith to testify on similar topics covered by the prosecution’s expert witnesses. Machan decided to limit the defense’s request, arguing that it would lead to a “battle of experts” that would “only confuse the jury and be useless.”
Mr. Smith published the thread about X in response to a judge’s decision to reject some of his testimony at trial.
“Judge Marchand was so restrictive in my testimony that the defense decided not to call me. It’s elementary for a judge to instruct a jury on the law, and I understand the judge’s hesitation. You can,” Smith wrote. “But federal election campaign law is very complicated. Even Antonin Scalia, a pretty smart guy, [if] You hate him – you once said [campaign finance] The law is so complicated that I can’t understand it. ”
“Part of the state’s case is that it misreported what it knew to be campaign spending in order to hide the payments until after the election,” Smith continued. “Mr. Cohen even testified that they just wanted the election to pass.”
“We reviewed the reporting schedule and even though we considered it to be a reportable campaign expenditure, the expenditures made on October 27th (when the funds were transferred to Daniels Atty) “The intention was to indicate that legally it would not be reported until December,” he explained, “which is a full 30 days after the election.”
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