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Michael Cohen Investigation

DanTheHorn

By DanTheHorn
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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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The Michael Cohen investigation and Stormy Daniels lawsuit issues are buried in the Mueller and Trump threads and really are unrelated. I think this new investigation is worthy of it' own thread because it can result in evidence and charges that are unrelated to Russia and will never get on Mueller's desk.   [sarcasm]Also, as long as Trump and Cohen did not conspire to commit any crimes together this investigation will have nothing to do with Trump [/sarcasm] so why bury it in the Trump thread.

Now that that is out of the way the Michael Cohen investigation will probably result in charges that are easier to prove such as the breaking of campaign financing laws. Fraud in filling out federal forms for loans. Less likely but possible threats against Stormy Daniels which could bring federal and state charges although the charge of harassment based on the article below may be difficult to prove. Also, Avenatti said they will not bring charges any time soon because a Nevada investigation could be used by Cohen to delay the civil suite until a criminal investigation in Nevada is resolved.

https://www.shouselaw.com/nevada/harassment.html

 

 

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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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The taint team is good in theory but people talk at the water cooler and one knows that stuff will get out. Rudy Giuliani said to the Washington Post that going after a lawyer is uncommon but not surprising. All I know is I do not like Trump or lawyers but this is still something that is hard to decide how one should feel about it.

Edited by DanTheHorn
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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31452

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I suspect that any campaign finance violation would be tied to exceeding donation limits by hiding identity.  But, I'm not sure that's worthy of executing a search warrant on an attorneys' office.  That is a really extraordinary step that would tend to require proof of criminal conduct exceeding probable cause and an inability to obtain evidence through other means.

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31452

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15 minutes ago, DanTheHorn said:

The taint team is good in theory but people talk at the water cooler and one knows that stuff will get out. Rudy Giuliani said to the Washington Post that the going after a lawyer is uncommon but not surprising. All I know is I do not like Trump or lawyers but this is still something that is hard to decide how one should feel about it.

It may be good in theory, but it's also good in practice.  A lawyer's office is bound to be full of attorney-client privileged material.  Therefore, whoever executes the warrant and reviews the seized material is highly likely to be exposed to such material.  Those people will have to be excluded from the investigative and prosecutorial team and subjected to a protective order with stiff penalties for violation.

 

It may not prevent leaks entirely, but there is every incentive by Mueller's team, and everyone involved, to preserve the attorney client privilege where it remains applicable.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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Oh by the way for the Trumpkins and Fox news watchers this is the guy leading the investigation. He also donated $5,400 to Trump campaign. I say it because I watched Laura Ingram last night and this was not mentioned and Trump implied he was a democrat.

DSq6mW6V4AAC_tD.jpg

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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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24 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

It may be good in theory, but it's also good in practice.  A lawyer's office is bound to be full of attorney-client privilege.  Therefore, whoever executes the warrant and reviews the seized material is highly likely to be exposed to such material.  Those people will have to be excluded from the investigative and prosecutorial team and subjected to a protective order with stiff penalties for violation.

 

It may not prevent leaks entirely, but there is every incentive by Mueller's team, and everyone involved, to preserve the attorney client privilege where it remains applicable.

Well since my communications skills suck I was not implying that things should not be separated between teams within the justice department. What I was trying to communicate is that this practice is in place to try to protect attorney client privilege but in the end it really doesn't because people talk. Going after an attorney has to have a damn high threshold and that is why even though I do not like Trump and lawyers it is hard to feel good about this step that has been taken. Now the other side of me feels like:

inglorious-bastards-gif-19.gif

Edited by DanTheHorn
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yaqdum

yaqdum 182

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the people involved here are among the highest professionals in the legal circles of this country.  the way mueller's team has operated without even wisps of leakage is probably how the entire operation will go.

 

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FWD

FWD 297

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Since the FBI wouldn't be inclined to leak this info, anything coming out about what the search regarded has to be presumed to be coming from Cohen's camp. If Stormy Daniels material was among the material the warrant covered it seems like that is what Cohen would want to leak, but there could be a lot more to it.

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31452

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27 minutes ago, DanTheHorn said:

Well since my communications skills suck I was not implying that things should not be separated between teams within the justice department. What I was trying to communicate is that this practice is in place to try to protect attorney client privilege but in the end it really doesn't because people talk. Going after an attorney has to have a damn high threshold and that is why even though I do not like Trump and lawyers it is hard to feel good about this step that has been taken. Now the other side of me feels like:

inglorious-bastards-gif-19.gif

I hear ya.  There will no doubt be temptation among members of the "taint team" to wink wink, nudge nudge about certain topics or areas of investigation prompted by privileged material.  The first line of defense against that is to insulate the taint team from the investigators, such that only non-privileged documents pass from one to the other and opportunity for non-written communication is minimized.

 

A similar thing is done in patent litigation, where the litigating attorneys, exposed to trade secret and proprietary materials, are banned from participating in the prosecution of patents on behalf of the client.  Breaches occur, but they are pretty rare and the lawyers take the thing pretty seriously.

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In10se

In10se 175

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41 minutes ago, DanTheHorn said:

Oh by the way for the Trumpkins and Fox news watchers this is the guy leading the investigation. He also donated $5,400 to Trump campaign. I say it because I watched Laura Ingram last night and this was not mentioned and Trump implied he was a democrat.

DSq6mW6V4AAC_tD.jpg

Of course Trump will lie about this. I bet this guy really didnt want to follow up on this but the evidence was overwhelming coming from Mueller that he had no choice. 

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RCRanger03

RCRanger03 1049

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Berman was recused from this deal due to his relationship with Guiliani which lead to:

On January 5, 2018 interim United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Geoffrey Berman named Khuzami as Deputy US Attorney for Manhattan. Khuzami was selected to serve as Enforcement Director by Mary Schapiro, the SEC Chairman appointed by Democratic President Barack Obama, he also spoke before the 2004 Republican National Convention on behalf of then-president George W. Bush for the extension of the Patriot Act. On April 28, 2005, he testified before the United States House of Representatives Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security in support of the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. He also donated to the presidential campaign of John McCain.

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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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3 minutes ago, RCRanger03 said:

Berman was recused from this deal due to his relationship with Guiliani which lead to:

On January 5, 2018 interim United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Geoffrey Berman named Khuzami as Deputy US Attorney for Manhattan. Khuzami was selected to serve as Enforcement Director by Mary Schapiro, the SEC Chairman appointed by Democratic President Barack Obama, he also spoke before the 2004 Republican National Convention on behalf of then-president George W. Bush for the extension of the Patriot Act. On April 28, 2005, he testified before the United States House of Representatives Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security in support of the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. He also donated to the presidential campaign of John McCain.

What are you saying? Are you saying Berman has recused himself from the Michael Cohen investigation? Link?

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Sawbonz

Sawbonz 27547

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1 hour ago, lemonlime said:

Using campaign funds to pay off the porn star the candidate slept with is not legal.

Isn’t that what got John Edwards in hot water? Someone in the campaign paying hush money to the chick he knocked up?

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JBJ

JBJ 3654

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20 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

Isn’t that what got John Edwards in hot water? Someone in the campaign paying hush money to the chick he knocked up?

Yes. $2 million dollars worth, iirc, but the DoJ dropped the case.

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RayDog

RayDog 682

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It will be interesting to see if Cohen has a record of a payoff or other records on the woman who claimed Trump had sex with her when she was 13. She dropped her lawsuit within days after the election saying it was due to threats, but there could have been a payoff.

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lemonlime

lemonlime 5503

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1 hour ago, DanTheHorn said:

Alt right internet troll probably making this up but hey it is the kind of stuff that is out there.

Not that I buy what Posobiec is saying, but given that Trump threw Cohen under the bus last week, he would be stupid to not cut a deal if one was in the offing.

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JBJ

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21 minutes ago, lemonlime said:

Not that I buy what Posobiec is saying, but given that Trump threw Cohen under the bus last week, he would be stupid to not cut a deal if one was in the offing.

Deal for what?

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JBJ

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5 minutes ago, SquishMitten said:

The FBI is going to rape him in the middle of the ocean?

No, no.  You're misunderstanding me.  If Cohen says no, then obviously the answer is no.  But he's not going to say no...because of the implication.

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lemonlime

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1 hour ago, longhornmatt said:

There were articles on Hotair and other blogs that basically just said Cohen sounds like he’s taking a deal because he (1) complimented how respectful and professional the FBI was in executing the searches and (2) admitted he was worried, instead of going all Trumpkin with bombastic smack talk.

i think that’s probably right, but it’s still not hard evidence and I wouldn’t be surprised if Posobiec’s “sources” were commentary like that, ala the $9.95 recruiting gurus using message boards and twitter consensus as sources.

That makes sense.  Also, I suspect Cohen is willing to make a deal, and is maybe trying to signal this to the FBI.  Trump threw him under the bus last week.  He has no reason to stay loyal to Dotus at this point and will probably lose his law license regardless of whether charges are brought against him.  The dotard in his narcissism, stupidity, and lack of loyalty to anyone while demanding obeisance in return,  is his own worst enemy.

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Pods

Pods 7552

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Don't forget Cohen has been good buddy's with Felix Sater since high school. Sater is probably a government witness, so they know what he knows about Cohen, but it's also an example for Cohen of lenient treatment in exchange for cooperation. I think he cracks and he knows everything. 

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DanTheHorn

DanTheHorn 4922

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The pundits say that since prosecutors won’t get to see or use any privileged material taken when FBI agents raided and searched Cohen’s law office, home and hotel room Monday the intrusion will not be a problem. This is because prosecutors and FBI agents create firewalls and taint teams to preclude privileged information from being used against the client in a criminal case.

 

But this analysis completely misses the point and ignores the distinction between the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution on the one hand, and the Fourth and Sixth Amendments on the other.

The Fifth Amendment is an exclusionary rule. By its terms, it prevents material obtained in violation of the privilege of self-incrimination from being used to incriminate a defendant – that is, to convict him or her of a crime.

But the Fourth and Sixth Amendments provide far broader protections: they prohibit government officials from in any way intruding on the privacy of lawyer-client confidential rights of citizens.

In other words, if the government improperly seizes private or privileged material, the violation has already occurred, even if the government never uses the material from the person from whom it was seized.

Not surprisingly, therefore, firewalls and taint teams were developed in the context of the Fifth Amendment, not the Fourth or Sixth Amendments. Remember who comprises the firewall and taint teams: other FBI agents, prosecutors and government officials, who have no right under the Fourth and Sixth Amendments even to see private or confidential materials, regardless of whether it is ever used against a defendant.

The very fact that this material is seen or read by a government official constitutes a core violation. It would be the same if the government surreptitiously recorded a confession of a penitent to a priest, or a description of symptoms by a patient to a doctor, or a discussion between a husband and wife of their sex life.

The government simply has no right to this material, whether it ever uses it against the penitent, the patient, or the spouse in a criminal case.

So let’s not dismiss the potential violation of the rights of Michael Cohen and President Trump, if it turns out that included among the materials seized by the government in the raid were private or confidential information or documents.

The recourses for intrusions on the Fourth and Sixth Amendments are multifold: the victim of an intrusion can sue for damages; he or she can exclude the material from use by the government in criminal or civil cases; or the victim can demand the material back. But none of these remedies undo the harm to privacy and confidentiality done to the citizen by the government’s intrusion into his private and confidential affairs.

An equally important harm is to important relationships that are protected by the law: between lawyer and client, priest and penitent, doctor and patient, husband and wife, etc.

If the ordinary citizen sees that even the president’s confidential communications with his lawyer can be seized and perused, he or she will be far less willing to engage in such communications. As a society we value such communications; that is why our laws protect them and that is why it should be extremely difficult for the government to intrude upon them, except as a last recourse in extremely important cases.

From what we know, this case does not meet those stringent standards. Much of the material sought from Cohen by the warrant could probably be obtained through other sources, such as bank, tax and other records that are subject to subpoena.

Moreover, the alleged crimes at issue – highly technical violations of banking and election laws – would not seem to warrant the extreme measure of a highly publicized search and seizure of records that may well include some that are subject to the lawyer-client privilege.

Someday soon, government is going to have to justify its decision to conduct this raid. I challenge any reader who is not concerned about the raid to honestly answer the following question: If the raid had been conducted on Hillary Clinton’s lawyer’s office and home, would you be as unconcerned?  The truth now!

Alan Dershowitz says the raid itself is an infringement on constitutional rights. So under his scenario we just need to be lawyers and we can plan criminal activity with our clients as long as they execute it and we would never be incriminated unless the client got caught and was a rat.  

Edited by DanTheHorn
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2018/04/11/alan-dershowitz-why-fbi-raid-on-trumps-lawyer-hurts-all-us.html
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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31452

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Dershowitz raises valid points.  These type of raids are highly problematic, even with "taint teams."

 

You overstate the contrary position, but to anyone who has considered them, attorney-client privilege and all the other privileges and the work product doctrine obscure the truth.  But most who have considered them find it an acceptable balance between permitting full disclosure between parties to a privilege and truth-seeking.

 

I ultimately don't have a problem with anything that makes the state's job more difficult in prosecuting the accused.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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Texas_Rocks

Texas_Rocks 346

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Would he make a deal if it was only about Stormy?


I heard that they may be trying get him on charges of fraud as a result of lying to the bank as to the original reason given for the loan. The hope I would assume is that leveraging him will result on him providing some salacious info on Trump.
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Anastasis

Anastasis 23469

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3 minutes ago, Texas_Rocks said:

 


I heard that they may be trying get him on charges of fraud as a result of lying to the bank as to the original reason given for the loan. The hope I would assume is that leveraging him will result on him providing some salacious info on Trump.

 

So he's getting popped on his HELOC? LOL. If that's the primary leverage point, I think we will all be disappointed. I want the pee tapes. 

Edited by Anastasis
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