New York – Lawyers for President Donald Trump’s personal attorney say investigators “took everything” during raids last week on his residence and office.
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The lawyers wrote in a court filing Monday that the raids a week ago to gather evidence from attorney Michael Cohen were “completely unprecedented.”
They said investigators seized more than a dozen electronic devices and other items including documents and data unrelated to the probable cause upon which the search warrants were based.
The raid carried out last Monday at Cohen’s apartment, hotel room, office and safety deposit box sought bank records, records on Cohen’s dealing in the taxi industry, Cohen’s communications with the Trump campaign.
The letter demanded Trump and Cohen’s lawyers be allowed to decide which items seized are protected by attorney-client privilege before criminal prosecutors see them.
The submission in Manhattan federal court came prior to a hearing scheduled for the afternoon. Prosecutors say Cohen is being investigated for an undisclosed crime related to his personal business dealings.
One of Trump’s lawyers, Joanna Hendon, filed papers late Sunday asking a federal judge to block prosecutors from studying material seized in the raid until Cohen and the president have both had a chance to review those materials and argue which are subject to attorney-client privilege.
“Fairness and justice — as well as the appearance of fairness and justice — require that, before they are turned over to the Investigative Team, the seized materials relating to the President must be reviewed by the only person who is truly motivated to ensure that the privilege is properly invoked and applied: the privilege-holder himself, the President,” Hendon wrote.
A word from the wise.
The FBI is out to get anyone that associates or once farted next to Trump. They are out hunting. If you were associated and have lots of personal info get a hold of Hillary’s Clorox wipes. The ones she used to delete her emails. Use it and put all your private info in cloud storage so its not accessible on your computer or tablets.
so… the FBI took the desks etc? this is a slimeball attorney . just like his client.
The only privileged material is in his giving of legal advice to Trump. His calls on behalf of Trump to pay off adulterers and the like are likely not privileged because they don’t involve legal services and were in furtherance of improper election payments.
Discussions about investing with Azerbaijani strongmen or Brazilian corrupt officials are not legal advice but Trump asking Cohen to vet someone for money laundering issues or about permissibly of certain investments or legality of meeting with foreigners after the election would certainly be privileged. Since Trump does not use email and Cohen claims he never recorded Trump most of these records will involve third parties so privilege is not going to cover a lot of it.
My bro Munch says the FBI used to be a symbol of national security for the Republicans, and that’s changed just because their president doesn’t get along with them.
I don’t understand why the president is not firing Comey!
I have to agree with poster #4 , at least in part. Assuming there was a legal document (in this case a non-disclosure agreement), then to this layperson that sounds like a legal service to me. The only drawback is that allegedly Trump knew nothing about it, so the question would be whether Trump actually had to know about it, seeing as Trump always referred to Cohen as his lawyer and history shows Trump had relied on Cohen to do thing for him on his behalf, apparently even of his own accord.