A New York state judge has suspended for a week any action regarding the conviction of President-elect Donald Trump for his attempted concealment of a payment to buy the silence of Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election campaign, according to a document made public Tuesday, November 12.
Judge Juan Merchan was expected to rule Tuesday on a defense request to throw out the entire proceeding, after the U.S. Supreme Court significantly expanded presidential immunity on July 1is July. Donald Trump argues that the case should be dismissed based on this ruling, which prosecutors dispute.
The appeal was filed before his re-election on November 5, on the grounds that evidence used by the prosecution relates to official acts during the Republican’s first term in the White House (2017-2021). But, according to email exchanges made public by the court, the defense also requested a freezing of the procedure, “and the final classification of the case”to take into account the Republican’s election to the White House.
“The public prosecutor recognizes that these are exceptional circumstances”conceded prosecutor Matthew Colangelo, in an email on Sunday. The judge postponed his decision until November 19 at the earliest.
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“The people agree that these are unprecedented circumstances”
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office said it agreed to a defense request to pause proceedings to consider how to approach the case after Donald Trump is re-elected to the White House. The president-elect will be inaugurated in January. “The people agree that these are unprecedented circumstances”estimated the prosecutor’s office.
In May, a New York jury found Donald Trump guilty in the Stormy Daniels affair, making him the first former US president to be convicted in court. After six weeks of debate, a jury of 12 citizens found Donald Trump guilty of 34 crimes of accounting falsification to hide from voters the payment of $130,000 to Mr.me Daniels, in order to avoid a sex scandal at the very end of his presidential campaign, in 2016, ultimately won against Hillary Clinton.
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His judicial horizon cleared by his re-election
The sentence, which can range from a fine to prison, should first have been pronounced on July 11 by the judge, but he agreed to postpone it for the first time to September 18, then to November 26, at the request Donald Trump’s lawyers.
Donald Trump’s former justice minister, Bill Barr, called for all charges to be dropped, saying they had been “engaged for political purposes and have been widely disseminated and rejected in the court of public opinion”.
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Indicted in four different criminal investigations, including one before federal justice in Washington for his allegedly illicit attempts to reverse the results of the 2020 election, the Republican has succeeded for months in delaying the proceedings. His re-election now almost completely clears his judicial horizon.
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