'Fixed': Judge Gave The New York City Jury A 55-Page Road Map To Find Trump Guilty

If the five-woman, seven-man jury doesn't find Donald Trump guilty of the alleged bookkeeping mistakes, it will be a miracle. This is because the 55-page final jury instructions that attorneys saw only moments before the judge read them in court on Wednesday is a "directed verdict" to Trump's guilt. That's it. That's why an uncharacteristically somber Trump announced that even "Mother Teresa couldn't beat these charges." The "fix is in," as one notable former U.S. attorney decreed. "This is most corrupt judicial proceeding in the history of the United States," former District of Columbia U.S. Attorney Joe diGenova told WMAL. Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz agrees that the fix is in. "The judge essentially instructed the jury to convict Trump," he titled his video. As I've said, jury instructions are key to understanding what the chances are of an acquittal or hung jury.

The most bizarre and worrisome thing about these instructions to the jury is that the judge gave jurors an a la carte menu of three choices — three crimes on which jurors may decide for themselves, individually, not unanimously what they think were Trump's motivations for making 34 bookkeeping notations. All Trump's complicity involves, and I'm not making this up, is if he may have been motivated to win the 2016 election, which means they can conclude he's guilty of a federal or state campaign law, or that he violated a tax law, for which there was no evidence offered. The only thing they must agree unanimously on are the 34 charged indictments. Prosecutors have hidden the ball on these predicate crime options since they were announced. But one of Alvin Bragg's theories was alluded to in his accompanying letter to the charges. And it's why, the Trump team tried to put on expert witness Brad Smith, who was the former head of the Federal Elections Commission.

Smith was to explain why Trump's legal payments to Michael Cohen weren't campaign expenses and why he, as the chairman of the FEC, turned down the request to jack up Trump on charges for them. In a gasp-inducing decision, Merchan said he would not allow Smith to do anything other than verify definitions of words without offering expert opinion on campaign law. The Trump team decided not to bother. It should have because it may have gotten some leading questions in there, and who knows what would have happened. Merchan said he didn't want to "confuse" the jurors because he's the arbiter of the law. Merchan is not an expert on campaign law. The decision not to put on Smith and take their chances might be the defense's biggest blunder.

And then in closing arguments, the prosecution was allowed multiple times to argue as fact that Donald Trump broke election law, a breathtaking assertion that had not been proven in court. They were also allowed under overruled objections to argue that Michael Cohen's plea deal which included copping to election violations could be tied back to Trump. The judge assured defense attorneys in advance that this plea deal could not be tied to Trump in court. And then he let prosecutors argue this in court.

• More at: PJ Media - 'FIXED'—Judge Gave the NYC Jury a 55-Page Road Map to Find Trump Guilty
https://pjmedia.com/victoria-taft/2024/05/30/the-judges-road-map-to-guilty-in-the-trump-case-n4929378
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