Donald Trump recently filed an "intriguing" letter in his New York criminal case involving alleged hush money payments, according to a legal analyst on Sunday.
Lawfare's Roger Parloff, who recently reported that Judge Cannon had created a "secret docket" in the process of overseeing the Trump case over classified documents, flagged the letter on his social media account. He said the letter was made public on April 3, and filed March 19.
"If Trump takes the stand, the People would seek to cross-examine him about '13 different court determinations' about him as well as the 'underlying facts' that led to those," Parloff wrote on Sunday. "We don’t know which prior court findings the People seek to introduce. (If the letter is imprecise, the People might also be seeking to put in other kinds of findings—like the Jan. 6 Committee’s.) In any case, Trump seeks to bar them all."
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Parloff further notes that case law in New York "calls for judges to hold a pretrial 'Sandoval' hearing where defendants can find out what evidence of their prior 'criminal, vicious, or immoral acts' the judge would let in if the defendant elects to testify."
"The judge is not supposed to allow in acts offered just to show the defendant’s 'bad character' or 'criminal bent.' Also, judges are supposed to avoid deterring the defendant from taking the stand—potentially depriving the jury of material evidence," he wrote. On the other hand, Parloff said, "the judge can let in acts to prove the defendant’s (1) lack of 'credibility, veracity or honesty' or (2) demonstrated willingness to put 'self-interest' above 'the interests of society.'"
"Those 2 categories neatly encapsulate virtually Trump’s entire life," he added, before estimating what the judge will ultimately conclude.
"My wild guesses are that Judge Merchan would keep out guilty pleas of Trump’s companies (technically not Trump); E Jean Carroll stuff (inflammatory); Trump U (settlement, not adjudication); J6 and Ukraine (inflammatory, cumbersome, not adjudicated)," he said, "but allow in 'persistent fraud' & 'charity fraud' adjudications and most underlying findings."
National security attorney Bradley Moss said Trump likely won't testify anyway.
"Trump's lawyers have every right to bring this challenge under the relevant case law, but is there anyone who realistically believes Trump would ever take the stand? No way. Not a chance," Moss said.
