by The judge presiding over Donald Trump’s cash trial in Manhattan cleared the courtroom and reprimanded a defense witness for his heavy sighs, eye rolls and audible responses to a series of objections to his testimony.
New York Judge Juan Merchan apologized to the jury on Monday to the Robert Costello school about “inappropriate decorum” in the courtroom minutes after he began his testimony.
“You don’t like my controls? You don’t say ‘jeez’,” he said. “You don’t roll your eyes. Do you understand that?”
In the midst of asking the jury to return, the judge served back: “Are you staring me down right now? Clean the courtroom.”
Members of the press and the public as well as the former president’s entourage were asked to leave, with court officials shouting “get out” at journalists who were suddenly forced out of open court.
According to a court transcript, the judge threatened to throw Mr. Costello out of the courtroom.
“Sir, your behavior at this moment is contemptible,” he told him while jurors, the press and members of the public were no longer in the room.
“I am telling you that your behavior is contemptible,” he said. “If you try to look down on me again, I’ll knock you off the stand. I will remove his entire testimony. Do you understand me?”
Mr Costello then asked if he could answer.
“No,” said Judge Merchan. “It’s not. This is not a conversation.”
Mr Costello, an attorney with ties to Rudy Giuliani, is likely to be the trial’s final witness, offering evidence aimed at undermining critical testimony from Mr Trump’s one-time “fixer”, Michael Cohen , who previously testified to what he called Mr Costello’s pressure campaign. ” to open a “back channel” of communication to Mr. Trump and Cohen under federal investigation.
After Cohen’s office and home were raided and phones seized by federal agents in April 2018, Mr. Costello suggested that Cohen retain him as counsel, in what Cohen said was an attempt to keep him close to Mr. Trump to prevent him from from “leaking” against him with information to federal investigators.
The landmark moment came in a Manhattan courthouse after a long day of testimony and debate about potential witnesses. Prosecutors rested their case against the former president on Monday afternoon after the final day of testimony from Cohen, the trial’s main witness, who explained how his life was “turned upside down” after he slept with his ex- commander.
Mr. Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records for a series of invoices and checks to Cohen in 2017 that reimbursed him for his payment to Stormy Daniels in the weeks before the 2016 presidential election. Prosecutors alleged that Mr. Trump illegally covered up information that could be politically damaging about his affairs to increase his chances of winning.
A Hail Mary request by Mr. Trump’s attorneys to dismiss the case in its entirety, based on Cohen’s testimony alone, ended Monday with Mr. Trump raging in the hall and calling Judge Merchan a “fake.”
Inside the courtroom, Mr. Costello said he did not pressure Cohen to do anything, that he only treated him as a client with his best interests in mind, and that he was not looking for an opportunity to represent him.
But under cross-examination by the prosecution, he admitted that he celebrated what he believed to be a major client, and that he would be “eternally grateful” to be “on the team” representing him, according to emails shown in court. .
Mr Costello will return to the witness stand on Tuesday, where he will face about an hour’s worth of questions before defense attorneys rest their case.
In his testimony last week, Cohen described Mr. Costello’s “outrageous” attempts to force him into his service.
“This is part of the pressure campaign, ‘everyone is lying to you, that you are still respected, the president still supports you, don’t talk, don’t listen to what the journalists or anyone is saying, and stay in the hit ,’” Cohen said last week. “‘Don’t flip, don’t cooperate.'”
Cohen did not trust him, he said, but remained “loyal to Mr. Trump.”
After conversations with his family, and what he described as a sense of obligation to his wife and children and “to the country,” Cohen said he came to the realization: “I decided I would no longer lie to President Trump . .”
He eventually pleaded guilty in August 2018 to campaign finance violations, tax evasion, and lying to Congress.
One day after Cohen’s guilty plea, Mr. Trump, in a tweethe made his length public: “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly advise you not to retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
On the 15th floor of the courthouse, moments after stepping outside Judge Merchan’s courtroom, Mr. Trump held an impromptu press conference to address the case.
“You saw what we saw. That was an incredible performance … a tyrant,” he said.
“This trial is a disaster for our country. It’s a disaster for New York City, New York State,” he said. “I think the press is not happy that they were thrown out of a courthouse. No one has ever seen anything like it.”
