Fani Willis Scores a Victory Against Trump Lawyers, but Judge ‘Very Skeptical’ of Her Desire for a Mega-Trial

The decision, during the first televised hearing, that the Georgia criminal cases against attorneys Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell will be heard together next month brings into focus how District Attorney Fani Willis’s sprawling racketeering case will unfold.For now, the prosecutor has notched her first win in her effort to try the 19 defendants in unison, as part of what she calls the same “criminal enterprise.” Lawyers from her office argue that “all of the evidence is admissible against all of the defendants” because of their alleged common aim — unlawfully keeping President Trump in office. Mr. Chesebro and Ms. Powell, two lawyers for Mr. Trump turned criminal defendants, have exercised their right under Georgia law for a speedy trial. Ms. Willis has maintained that she wants to try all of the defendants in October. Mr. Trump has moved to detach his trial from that timeline, and his erstwhile chief of staff, Mark Meadows, hopes to be tried in federal court. The presiding judge, Scott McAfee, announced his intention to make the “October 23rd trial date stick,” at least for Mr. Chesebro and Ms. Powell. He allowed that he “remains very skeptical” that the other 17 defendants will all be tried on that expedited timeline. Ms. Willis’s prosecutors predicted that their case will take four months and require the testimony of more than 150 witnesses. The judge called that plan “unrealistic.” An attorney for Mr. Chesebro, Scott Grubman, reckons that Georgia “wants to make the case against Donald Trump” and that, according to prosecutors’ logic, “half of the United States took an overt act to elect Donald Trump” by voting for him in the last election. A racketeering case, they argue, “does not override fundamental fairness” with respect to the constitutional promise of due process. The lawyers for Mr. Chesebro, in arguing that he should stand trial alone, underscored the contrast between the allegations against Ms. Powell — for conspiring to break into voting systems — with those against his client, who is charged for his role in the alternate elector scheme, which he characterized as arid and arcane, comprising “boring old charges.” One of Mr. Chesebro’s attorneys acknowledged that he “didn’t know what the 12th Amendment was” before he took on his case. That is the part of the Constitution that ordains how electoral votes are to be counted and the vice president’s role in supervising that process. Mr. Chesebro, along with another lawyer, John Eastman, is charged with attempting to thwart that process. Ms. Powell’s attorney, Brian Rafferty, argued that she has “nothing to do with most of the indictment” and was “not the driving force” behind the computer break-in. He previewed that her defense at trial will rely on “authorization,” or the position that poll workers granted Ms. Powell and others permission to review the results. Mr. Chesebro’s counsel allowed, “I don’t know that there’s a legal theory out there that says it, but it’s just a reality that” trying his client and Ms. Powell together will prejudice his client because the charges against her are more “provocative.” Mr. Chesebro, he reckons, stands accused of sending just “18 emails” and “transmitting” memoranda he wrote on the elector question. Ultimately, Judge McAfee found that “based on what’s been presented today, I am not finding the severance from Mr. Chesebro or Ms. Powell is necessary to achieve a fair determination of the guilt or innocence for either defendant in this case.”

Fani Willis Scores a Victory Against Trump Lawyers, but Judge ‘Very Skeptical’ of Her Desire for a Mega-Trial

Fani Willis Scores a Victory Against Trump Lawyers, but Judge ‘Very Skeptical’ of Her Desire for a Mega-Trial

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