Highly Speculative

[George K]

@Copper said in Highly Speculative:

Is he getting paid for a conviction?

Not yet.

[LuFins Dad]

It’s certainly possible. The whole 4/4/4 thing happens to confuse me. I assume he means that all 12 have to agree that a crime occurred, not the same 4 people voting yes on each charge. He’s basically just saying if everybody agrees something illegal happened, but we don’t know what, don’t worry about it. We’ll punish him anyway.

[LuFins Dad]

@Jolly said in Highly Speculative:

@LuFins-Dad said in Highly Speculative:

@Mik said in Highly Speculative:

This just gets more and more bizarre.

Rumble? Yeah…

Doesn't matter a bit. Two questions to ask yourself:

1. Can it be done?

Rumble? Apparently not well…

YES

2. Will this judge do it to obtain a conviction?

That's an interesting question.

Not really, it’s conjecture built on conjecture. Dersh is upfront about that. I think what he saw the day the Judge cleared the court has him very flabbergasted.

Now Dersh, he’s the interesting story in this to my mind. The guy still has liberal leanings and tendencies to my mind. He is upfront that he voted for Biden. He is not a conservative or even a moderate by any stretch of the imagination, but he is a Legal Boomer yelling “Get Off My Lawn!” when it comes to a lot of stuff that has been happening in the courts recently, and has become a Conservative favorite despite not being a Conservative and advocating against Conservative principles. At the same time, he has been ostracized by his friends, colleagues, and is basically a man on an island. It’s fascinating to watch.

[George K]

Turley on the 4-4-4:

First, the judge has ruled that the jury does not have to agree on what actually occurred in the case. Merchan ruled that the government had vaguely referenced three possible crimes that constitute the “unlawful means” used to influence the election: a federal election violation, the falsification of business records, and a tax violation. The jurors were told that they could split on what occurred, with four jurors accepting each of the three possible crimes in a 4-4-4 split. The court would still consider that a unanimous verdict so long as they agree that it was in furtherance of some crime.

Second, the judge said that he would instruct the jury on the law but then omitted the key elements that established there was no federal campaign violation. Indeed, the blocked legal expert, Ben Smith, the former chair of the Federal Election Commission, was going to testify that this could not have been a federal election violation. Moreover, even if Trump’s legal settlement money could be viewed as a federal campaign contribution, it could not have been part of a conspiracy to influence the election since any reporting of a contribution would have had to occur after the election.

Third, not only can the jury disagree as to what occurred, but one of the three crimes is so circular as to produce vertigo in the jury room. The prosecutors zapped a dead misdemeanor back into life by claiming a violation under New York’s election law 17-152. The argument is that the crime was committed to further another crime as an unlawful means to influence the election. However, that other crime can be the falsification of business records. So the jury (or some jurors, at least) could find that some documents were falsified as an unlawful means of falsifying other documents.

Finally, Merchan is allowing conviction based on a “general intent” to defraud “any person or entity,” a dangerously vague concept in this novel criminal case. Merchan has largely stuck to the standard jury instructions but this case is anything but standard. With an ambiguous claim of “influencing” an election, a general intent instruction without better definition to this case can be an invitation for bias.

Given the instructions and the errors in this trial, it would seem that an acquittal is almost beyond the realm of possibility. That leaves either a hung jury or a conviction. However, the framing of this case and failure to protect the rights of the defendant have undermined the perceived legitimacy of the proceedings and any possible verdict.

[Jolly]

@LuFins-Dad said in Highly Speculative:

@Jolly said in Highly Speculative:

@LuFins-Dad said in Highly Speculative:

@Mik said in Highly Speculative:

This just gets more and more bizarre.

Rumble? Yeah…

Doesn't matter a bit. Two questions to ask yourself:

1. Can it be done?

Rumble? Apparently not well…

YES

2. Will this judge do it to obtain a conviction?

That's an interesting question.

Not really, it’s conjecture built on conjecture. Dersh is upfront about that. I think what he saw the day the Judge cleared the court has him very flabbergasted.

Now Dersh, he’s the interesting story in this to my mind. The guy still has liberal leanings and tendencies to my mind. He is upfront that he voted for Biden. He is not a conservative or even a moderate by any stretch of the imagination, but he is a Legal Boomer yelling “Get Off My Lawn!” when it comes to a lot of stuff that has been happening in the courts recently, and has become a Conservative favorite despite not being a Conservative and advocating against Conservative principles. At the same time, he has been ostracized by his friends, colleagues, and is basically a man on an island. It’s fascinating to watch.

I don't think Dersh has changed that much. He's still basically a defense attorney desperately hoping for a fair and unbiased trial and noticeably upset when it becomes evident that someone has their fingers on the scales of Justice.

[Mik]

I still do not see how this can be deemed in furtherance of a crime if that crime has not been established, prosecuted or even agreed upon.

[LuFins Dad]

@Mik said in Highly Speculative:

I still do not see how this can be deemed in furtherance of a crime if that crime has not been established, prosecuted or even agreed upon.

I think @jon-nyc just pointed it out. The crime covered doesn’t need to be Trump’s. Cohen has plead guilty and been convicted. They could use the argument that Trump was trying to hide Cohen’s crime…

[Mik]

FFS

[Horace]

The law is a cornucopia of possibilities, as every good lawyer knows.

[LuFins Dad]

@Mik said in Highly Speculative:

FFS

Yeah. That’s what I’ve been missing in all this, myself. That’s really something, innit?

[jon-nyc]

It seems really straightforward. If you falsify a business record that’s a misdemeanor. Of you do it with intent to cover up a crime it’s a felony.

It makes sense that the record falsifying person doesn’t have to have been the one that committed the crime, as long as he’s intentionally helping to cover it up.

Take it out of a political context. A CFO falsifies records to cover up the fact that his company bribed a local official. He knew about it and is covering it up even though it was the head of sales who paid the actual bribe.

This is the same concept as ‘aiding and abetting ‘ or ‘accesory after the fact’.

[LuFins Dad]

Did we listen to the same advisory opinions last night?

[jon-nyc]

I’m speaking specifically to the point that it needn’t have been Trump who committed the underlying crime. That NY law isn’t the travesty it sounds like to some people.

[Jolly]

And when this conviction gets overturned, I guess it will still be a good law?

Look...If I was somebody running a major corporation, do you think it wise to headquarter in New York?

[jon-nyc]

Not if I were going to falsify business records.

[LuFins Dad]

@Jolly said in Highly Speculative:

And when this conviction gets overturned, I guess it will still be a good law?

Look...If I was somebody running a major corporation, do you think it wise to headquarter in New York?

Let’s address the “overturning” of the conviction. Let me introduce you to the appellate court that will be the next stop for Justice Impacted President Trump -

[Jolly]

@jon-nyc said in Highly Speculative:

Not if I were going to falsify business records.

If I walked into the firm where you were previously employed, with 30 auditors, unlimited time and unlimited budget, do you think I could find something Twinkie Bragg could prosecute?

[George K]

[Jolly]

Ladies and Gentlemen, pick your weapons.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/trump-conviction-will-kick-off-war-of-weaponization-of-us-justice-system-warns-alan-dershowitz/ar-BB1npj1g?ocid=BingNewsSerp

[Doctor Phibes]