New York prosecutors have signaled their willingness to consider a one-month delay for the start of Donald Trump’s hush-money criminal trial, citing the need to accommodate the former president’s legal team’s review of recently obtained evidence.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office, in a court filing on Thursday, expressed openness to the delay “in an abundance of caution,” but emphasized opposition to a more extended postponement, leaving the final decision to Judge Juan Manuel Merchan.
A Key Legal Battle Amid Presidential Ambitions
With jury selection slated for March 25, the hush-money case represents one of four criminal indictments against Trump, who is the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
Trump’s lawyers have disclosed receiving a substantial volume of evidence from the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan over the past two weeks, including records related to former Trump lawyer-turned-prosecution witness Michael Cohen, which they assert are favorable to the defense.
While prosecutors maintain that most of the newly disclosed material is irrelevant to the case at hand, they acknowledge the relevance of some records. Trump’s legal team has requested a 90-day delay in addition to urging for the case’s dismissal, alleging prosecutorial misconduct due to the belated disclosures and purported violations of evidence-sharing rules inherent in the discovery process.
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Legal Maneuvers in Trump’s Hush-Money Trial
The crux of the dispute revolves around the timing of the defense’s subpoena for the full case file, lodged on January 18, a mere nine weeks before jury selection was set to commence.
The district attorney’s office contends that Trump’s lawyers contributed to the issue by delaying their subpoena request, having had access to a partial set of records since June of the previous year. Despite their earlier request for the full file, the U.S. attorney’s office only provided a subset of records, prompting the recent flurry of legal maneuvers.
As the courtroom drama unfolds, the fate of Trump’s hush-money trial remains uncertain, with the specter of a delayed start looming large.
The legal wrangling underscores the complexities and challenges inherent in ensuring a fair trial, as both sides grapple with the intricacies of evidence disclosure and procedural fairness in the pursuit of justice.
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