Trump lawyer to plead the 5th in Stormy Daniels court case
President Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen said he will plead the Fifth Amendment in the case brought by adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Cohen made the assertion in a signed statement filed in federal court Wednesday.
He said in the filing he would assert his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination because of a criminal investigation targeting him, which led to his New York office, home and hotel room being raided by federal agents this month.
Cohen said federal investigators seized electronic devices and documents, which include information pertaining to a $130,000 payment Cohen made to Daniels to keep her silent about accusations of an affair with Donald Trump.
Trump denied the affair and said he didn’t know anything about the payment.
Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, sued Cohen and Trump in hopes of being freed from the agreement.
Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, said he expected Cohen to plead the Fifth Amendment.
“This is a stunning development,” Avenatti said Wednesday evening on Twitter. “Never before in our nation’s history has the attorney for the sitting President invoked the 5th Amend in connection with issues surrounding the President.”
In a criminal trial, a jury is instructed to not draw any conclusions when a defendant invokes the Fifth Amendment, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that doesn’t apply to civil cases. A jury could infer Cohen’s silence as guilt.
Avenatti said Cohen served as Trump’s “fixer,” helping to solve problems before they became bigger issues.
Along with making the payment to Daniels, Cohen negotiated a $150,000 payment in 2016 from the parent company of the Nation
al Enquirer for Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who said she had an affair with Trump.
A federal judge in New York is to decide Thursday whether to appoint a special master to oversee the examination of documents seized from Cohen’s office to determine whether they should be shielded from federal investigators by attorney-client privilege.
Attorneys for the president asserted in court documents Wednesday that they were capable of such a document review.
“Our own associates … are exceptionally well-qualified, hailing from the country’s best law schools and having worked directly with the partners at our firm on complex, confidential government investigations, civil litigation, or both,” the Trump lawyers stated in a letter to U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood. “Finally, our client will make himself available, as needed, to aid in our privilege review on his behalf.”
Federal prosecutors argued that a division of the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, known as a filter team, could determine which documents were relevant to the criminal investigation of Cohen and which are protected by attorney-client privilege.