Attorney and Author Dan Conaway and Mike Brooks Radio show "Arrested"
Attorney and Author Dan Conaway and Mike Brooks Radio show "Arrested"
Michael Cohen - So much to discuss from a legal perspective
Michael Cohen testifies before Congress. He's a convicted liar. Do we believe him?
Welcome to arrested at the only vive and local show that takes him into the belly of our criminal justice system. Cohosted by Mike Brooks and Atlanta criminal defense attorney, Dan Conaway of Conaway and Strickler PC. Good morning everybody. Welcome to arrested. Appreciate you joining us this lovely Saturday morning. Well, I'll tell you what, Dan is
Speaker 2:been up, it's been a big wig, uh, up on Capitol Hill, that's for sure. Just on Wednesday, uh, Michael Cohen spoke to the House oversight committee, one of three tests, one of three committees he has been speaking to, we spoke to during the week. And um, and I tell you what, there he got it. He got up there and, and Jim Jordan I think laid it out. He just laid him out right from the very beginning and some people found it to be credible, but I think a majority of people, they really don't know what to believe since he was, he's now a convicted felon, accused of lying to Congress and where it was in front of Congress again. So, and then on a Thursday, which we'll talk about as a, as, as we get going here on this particular case, the GOP to GOP representatives have referred Michael Cohen to the Department of Justice for Ledge Perjury during that hearing. And we'll, and we'll get to that as well. So number one, why did Elijah Cummings, the chairman of the committee, why would he want to have as his first committee hearing of this new Congress, why you would want to bring in, I convicted felon who's going to be starting his a federal prison time on May six? I don't know. All right, next question.
Speaker 3:Does my honest answer. Uh, I just don't know. Uh, obviously I can't read his mind, but, um, uh, you know, I don't know. I'm not a politician. I'm a criminal defense attorney. Um, so what I can tell you is that from a lawyer point of view, from a legal point of view, the colon is just a chromium Conan. It's just a crummy witness. I mean, it's the absolute worst witness in the world as far as, um, as far as, uh, you know, dealing with somebody, uh, as a witness. He was just absolutely terrible. Um, I can't think of a witness that's more vulnerable to cross examination.
Speaker 2:Well, number one is your number one. If, if I, if I was Lanny Davis, uh, would you even, would you even allow your client to, uh, to, to testify in front of a hearing?
Speaker 3:Well, you know, that brings up a great issue in that is, um, Lanny Davis. My understanding is that he is a, um, and, and that's my understanding is that he's represented Hillary Clinton and, uh, and, and, uh, people associated with her campaign in some capacity. I'm not familiar with that and not familiar with the details of that deal. Is that your understanding, Mike?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. And you know, and, but with this, with this particular case, it says more, I think he was there to testify and I think the, the Democrats were there to try to prop him up, if you will, because it was, seemed like it was, this is the beginning of his redemption tour.
Speaker 3:Well, it brings up the first issue and that is, is that, why is Lanny Davis assume that Lanny Davis is or was representing Hillary Clinton and her interests are the interests of others associated with her campaign? Right. Why is it that he's now representing Michael Cohen? To me, I see a potential conflict there between the, where whenever you hire a law firm, they do a conflicts check to see if there's any conflict between, uh, the person who wishes to hire you. Right. As a new client versus former clients, it's called the conflict check where you don't have a conflict of interest. Here I see a clear conflict of interest in my opinion. Um, because, uh, Hillary Clinton's interests as either a former or current client of Mr. Davis does not coincide necessarily with the interests of Mr. Cohen and a, so there's a problem, there's a conflict that's inherently baked in there to potentially they're both witnesses to the same event. Now, I know that the Russian collusion issue is being investigated. Mueller is investigated by Mueller, right. Whereas this whole Cohen thing is being handled by the southern district of New York and he was turning his office there,
Speaker 2:but he was interviewed, he[inaudible] seven times by the special counsel
Speaker 3:by the special counsel. And also during the questioning yesterday he was questioned about Russian collusion and this, she's like that related to the Mueller investors.
Speaker 2:Okay, sure. Right. Have you been to, chuck does, have you ever been to the Czech Republic? All, everything, yeah.
Speaker 3:So you've got a situation there where, um, Mr, uh, where the attorney, Mr. Davis, maybe conflicted, uh, I see reasonable arguments why he is, where he's conflicted between representing what's in the best interest of his former or current client, Hillary Clinton or her, the people on her team versus Uncle Colin.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, that's, that's the first thing right there, especially since he also, when, when asked by members of the committee about who he conferred with before his testimony and he conferred with Elijah Cummings of course with his attorney and also, um, with some of the other democratic leaders and the Democratic National Committee. Right. So He's a, he appears to be a huge conflict of interests from what I see.
Speaker 3:Huge conflict of interest. So why is this lawyer who is so closely associated with the Clinton campaign and the DNC and all these other things, why is he representing Michael Cohen and why would Michael Cohen wants to be represented by him? Quite frankly. Um, you would think you'd want somebody completely independent of Clinton, DNC, all that stuff. So, um, the bottom line in this case that he's a terrible witness. Uh, the way that you resuscitate or the way that you tried to make a, a crummy witness better, uh, and the government, the government, and sometimes the defense, we have to use crummy witnesses sometimes. Uh, you know, here we've got a convicted felon. It's not the first time a convicted felon has given testimony.
Speaker 2:Right. And He, and they pointed it out during the hearing yesterday, you know, there've been mobsters in front of Congress and in front of the court, the court. So yeah,
Speaker 3:it is what it is. Um, but what you have to do is you have to rehabilitate that witness. If you're, let's assume you're the government, right? It's the government witness. Okay. You have to rehabilitate that witness through massive crop operation via documents and other credible witnesses. If you don't have those things, then the witness is useless to you because he's so tainted to begin with.
Speaker 2:By him calling the prison, he said, you know, in his opening statement, you know, I'm ashamed of my own failings and I publicly accepted responsibility for them by pleading guilty in the southern district of New York. I am ashamed of my weakness and misplaced loyalty of the things I did for Mr. Trump. In an effort to protect and promote him. I am ashamed that I chose to take part concealing Mr Trump's illicit acts rather than listening to my own conscience. I am ashamed because I know that Mr. Trump it what Mr. Trump is, he is a racist. He is a con man. He is a cheap, you know, so I mean it goes on and on. And
Speaker 3:one of the things about that is that um, it's just, it's deeply disturbing, not only a crummy witness, right. Meaning it was just terrible with, yeah, because I mean on cross examination, if you're the defense attorney, if this were a trial or an impeachment proceeding, whatever, you would have a field day with this witness. Oh, I mean you could go on. I you go on for days with Mr. Cohen if you're cross examining him. I mean you had so much material to work with. It's almost laughable as far as conflicting statements and interests. Even during this statement yesterday he talked about his book deal about how he's considering a book deal. Yeah. I mean so it just goes on and on and on, on, on. And so you would just have a field day cross examining him. So he really is a terrible witness for the government. I don't see how you can establish probable cause with this witness, let alone proof beyond a reasonable doubt. It's also deeply disturbing to see a lawyer disparaged her former client, especially in public in that way. I mean, I've never seen it before. I've never seen it. I've never heard of it. Never heard of. Never seen it. Yeah. And that to me, that's just shows to me, if I'm a juror, forget about Donald Trump. Forget about all the other players. To me that just shows what a terrible, um, individual this is as an attorney because you're attacking and name calling your own client.
Speaker 2:I got a client did he had for years? Yes.
Speaker 3:Do that. You just, you know, that's just not something you do. You have a duty to sell. So that represents your client. It may be a former client at this point, but you, your duty is still there and you don't disparage, you're on client and public for in order to effect some sort of personal or professional game. Uh, you just, that's just not what you do.
Speaker 2:No, no, not at all. And I mean it and it was so obvious, you know, right from the very beginning. Um, the witness is supposed to supply members of the committee, uh, their written statement within 24 hours of the, uh, you know, of, of the hearing. And apparently they did. And one of the first orders of business was that the chairman, Elijah Cummings, basically there's, oh, we're going to vote to accept it even though he was in violation of the rules. We're going to do away with the rules. We're going to move the goalposts because we're the majority and we can make it happen.
Speaker 3:And there, there's a whole issue there with respect to this hole. We'll get to that because, and again, why is this hearing being held? It's to me there's some legal, I'm going to go through the legal issues. Are there political issues there you think? Obviously, but you know, as far as the legal issues are concerned, um, there's a, there's a second issue here I want to go into and that is, and you talked about moving the goalposts, uh, their goalposts being moved all over the place in this situation. Um, one issue you've got here, which is really, um, a concern to me. Uh, and it's sort of what you bring up where they choose to change the rules at the last minute. Right. Uh, is we've got another issue here that I'd like to talk about after the break. And that is the attorney client privilege, right? Which is all over the place in the states. Right,
Speaker 2:exactly. I mean it's, it's a huge issue now. You're not only with Mr. Trump but with president Trump, but with his other clients that he's had. And one of the things that really bothered me as a former investigated it, we'll talk about, we'll talk about maybe New York law is, uh, the over 100 recordings that he has between he and his clients. You know, I mean, I as an attorney and unbeknownst to the client, exactly as far as we know as far as we know, but he, he didn't deny any of it. That's a chore. You know, cause I asked him how many, it was well over a hundred secretly taping as exactly. So we've got lots more to break down on on Wednesday's hearing in front of the House oversight committee with former Trump attorney Michael Cohen. When we return, you're listening to arrested with Mike Brooks and criminal defense story. Dan Conaway on a new talk one oh six this is arrested with Mike Brooks and Atlanta criminal defense attorney Dan Conaway. Thanks everybody for joining us here on a, on this wonderful Saturday morning. And by the way, if you haven't picked up Dan's book, arrested to do yourself a favor, log on to arrested book.com you can order it there. You could order it through Amazon, Barnes and noble, but please go get the book arrested battling in America's criminal justice system. It will lay out what the criminal justice system is all about from, from, you know, in every aspect of the criminal justice system. Hopefully you never get hemmed up in the criminal justice system and you'll stay clear of that. But I tell you just to, just for your own edification, just to, just to learn more about the criminal justice system here in United States, go get the book arrested, battling America's criminal justice system by our Dan Conaway. All Right, counselor, uh, getting back to the Michael Cohen hearings on Wednesday, uh, at least the public hearing, there was another hearing behind closed doors on Thursday with the House intelligence committee, but we don't know what was going on with that. And there was another one behind closed doors on Tuesday, but the one public hearing, uh, on Wednesday, I tell you what, it was interesting with a little bit of fireworks involved too, which we'll talk about. But before we went to break, we're talking about the issue of, of attorney, client privilege. And, and this particular case, I've never seen an attorney, uh, talk about a client and, and, and, and the case and what then the different cases and how we represent this client over 10 years. And I just basically, I, I wanna say it, put his stuff into street, but it really did. And then the mere fandom and then the, uh, issue of all of these recorded conversations, where do they be in person conversations or they be conversations via the phone in the state in New York. It's just, it's just, it's mind boggling to me.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's almost Nixonian in a way where you go back to the days when are they had the tape recording devices there and nobody knew there were being tape recorded. Yeah. Um, so, uh,
Speaker 2:and Oval Office and, and, and other places as well.
Speaker 3:Places as well. Um, so, you know, uh, I don't know. I don't know what to say to that. I mean to record a conversation and did not have the client know, uh, you know, that you're taking notes or you're recording it
Speaker 2:or whatever. Let me ask you, do you, have you ever recorded conversations?
Speaker 3:Sure. But we, if we do, we make sure the client knows it. Okay. And then on the flip side, we take notes. Main thing we do is we take notes because I prefer notes as opposed to recordings for the simple fact that then there's no issue there. It's clearly attorney, client work product. Yeah. And meaning it's just us writing, right. And then two, it's completely privileged and you don't have an issue there. Tape recordings are arguably privileged as well, but I'm just not in love with tape recording period. If there's some reason why we want to do it, then we would tell the client. Right. But otherwise, no, I just prefer taking notes because notes are important because you know, there's a lot going on. A case you've got to take notes, you had to document what's going on, all that. But that's all protected both by attorney client, uh, both by attorney work product and also by attorney client privilege. So here you've got a lawyer who's just secretly taping his clients and I don't get that to me that it's just wrong and, uh, not, not something that we should be doing as attorneys.
Speaker 2:And you know what, it sounded like it sounds as if, um, I don't know for sure, but it sounds as if even after the cases were disposed of and you know, we're, we're done with that. He, he knows his joint, the team, he didn't have strong
Speaker 3:no. And uh, uh, and so you're just kind of what always tell clients is, you know, it's just me, you and the tree, the fig tree, my office and I don't talk in the tree. Doesn't talk. Yeah. And neither one of us were recording you, so,
Speaker 2:well let me ask you, you know, when, when they went and raided his offices in New York and also his hotel room, uh, where he was living at the time in New York City, when with the southern district of New York and they took the, they took evidence, it took papers, computers and everything else. And, um, I'm, uh, I, I'm assuming he took these, these tapes as well. Could the prosecutor use these tapes and go through the tapes? So if he, if he obtained them legally through warrant and use them for other, to bring other charges against him
Speaker 3:to bring your other charges against my uncle Colin. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 2:Ponce found any wrong doing,
Speaker 3:it's possible. It would depend upon the scope of the warrant and everything else. But it's possible. I think the simplest way to explain the, the real, the real nut of this situation here is that there's a, there are department of Justice FBI guidelines. Um, and I'm quoting from searches of premises of subject attorneys. Uh, it's section nine, 13.4 20
Speaker 2:and the attorney general guidelines.
Speaker 3:Yup. Right. And, uh, it goes through what to do. It starts with the fact that you should use alternative search warrants to begin with to try to obtain the information, including subpoenas, other, another other investigative techniques to, it does authorize the use of a search warrant and the search for an attorney's office, but in a very limited exceptions. And then there's a lot of safeguards in place to deal with the type of issue you're talking about. Basically what they do is they isolate the idea is to isolate the seized items and to put them off to the side so that when they're going through stuff, they're leaving everything alone that's not related in any way, uh, to the investigation, whatever it is they're investigating.
Speaker 2:So what we'll have to start list where they listen to a little bit of it and if it didn't have anything to do with the main scope
Speaker 3:of their investigation and to put that to the side, basically they put a Chinese wall up between the two. Yeah. You've got one team that's there to make sure that, uh, attorney client privilege is protected for all this stuff that's not related to the investigation of Michael Cohen and Donald Trump in any illegal activity being performed by Michael Cohen. Um, there's a issue here and that's the crime fraud exception and a crime fraud exception. It's very simple. It says that, for instance, again, if you come to alternate and say, well, you know, I sold some drugs last week, uh, that's privileged. But if you come to an attorney and say, I'm going to sell some drugs tomorrow and I want to hide the drugs here in your office and picked them up from your safe tomorrow morning. Right. Because I think the police might be watching my house and the attorney says, fine, give me the drugs and puts them into safe then that's not privileged. No. Right? So that's the, that's the exception to the rule. So the point here would be that the Mueller team would be looking for issues that violate, uh, the crime product that, that meet the crime fraud exception. I sh I should say to attorney client privilege as the simplest way to describe that. Now, the other issue here is Donald Trump, the client. And that is, he did arguably a waive privilege with respect to aspects of this case. Okay. Right. And Giuliani, his current lawyer, basically he said that right, to cooperate and help. Sure. And that's okay. Trump can do that. But if you're talking about, again, here you have Cohen going back in time and talking about cases and stuff and information that has nothing to do or arguably has nothing to do with the Russian case, with a stormy Daniels issue with campaign finance law, which we'll get to all that stuff, right? Yeah. And so there, the question is the Trump wave privilege with respect to all these other issues that he's bringing up and with which he's being asked questions about during the congressional hearing yesterday, right. Because you can waive privilege to an extent to cover x, Y, and Z that you're cooperating with the government on. But it's not blanket, it's not blanket. Gotcha. So we don't know, but we have these issues percolating around out there. And again, it's just is, um, uh, it's not how you do business as a lawyer. You know, your job is to zealously represent your client, your client's interests come first. That's it. It's a very simple job description. You know, if I'll be, if I were one of his other,
Speaker 2:one of his other clients in the past and all this was going obviously it, oh my God, what did they, what did they know about me being pissed? I would tell, you know what, what has he done? Woo Woo. What does the FBI or DOJ would have? What did, what did they looked at, you know, what do they know about me now? You know, are they coming at of as your possibility to come after me cause you got me. You can go through some and find maybe a violation of something. But I mean I would be just really, really pissed to be honest.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I would be two and a, and that brings up another issue that we want to talk about. And that's, I'm really focusing on the, on the violation of, uh, these campaign finance laws, which the media is talking about right now. My understanding is that Mr. Cohen was not, did not plead guilty to violating campaign finance laws. Off the top of my head. I'm rattled.
Speaker 2:No, I don't, I don't, I don't believe so either. All process crimes weren't there. Yeah. For the most part, you know, but, but the, the, the payment perjury in there. Yeah. But see that the whole payment to stormy Daniels and Karen Mcdougal, um, you know, they're trying to say, well, was that money part of a campaign? But I believe, and they talked about it also. There was another, uh, uh, a painting that was bought at an auction that day were kind of hinting, nor kind of putting it into people's minds. And it might've been a campaign campaign finance violation, you know, but the money it seemed came from one charity and it was and the auction was and to another chair.
Speaker 3:Well it see, that would be a great example of did Trump really violate the Trump really give, waive his privilege with respect to this issue involving an auction. Yeah. Right. Did he really get, how does, how is that related in anyway to Russian collusion if it's arguably for violation of campaign finance laws, that would be the kind of thing that you, you have to really take a look at. Did Donald Trump actually waive privilege or the district or that particular issue?
Speaker 2:No, but it's interesting. We'll continue to, uh, to talk about this and break down the, the house hearings on Wednesday and, and, and we also now, late in the day on now on Thursday, heard that the GOP has referred Michael Cohen Cohen to the DOJ for alleged perjury during the hearing. We'll have that a whole lot more coming up on arrested with Mike Brooks and criminal defense attorney Dan Kahn on a new talk. What a successful this is. Arrested with Mike Brooks and Atlanta criminal defense attorney. Damn Conaway, thanks for joining us on arrested. And if you have not picked up Dan cutaways, book arrested, Beilein America's criminal justice system, go to arrested book.com. Go to Amazon Barnes Noble. Pick that up. I'm guarantee. I'll guarantee it. Will it, it, it's a great read number one and it gives you an insight, a fantastic insight into America's crump criminal justice system. And, and I hope, I hope you never have to be part of the criminal justice system, but, uh, it, it, it's a great read if you are or even if you never will be.
Speaker 3:Mike, that is a blessing I give to both former clients, uh, or end two other individuals. I always say, man, you'd never need my service
Speaker 2:with a little side of the cross. Amen. So on Wednesday, the, uh, the House oversight committee, uh, had in the hot seat, former Trump attorney, Michael Cohen, and, and we've been breaking down his, uh, his testimony and, you know, number one, what a terrible witness he was. You know, uh, you know, uh, the attorney client privilege that we were just talking about and now, you know, they were talking about some of the payments, you know, whether it be for a painting, talked about stormy Daniels, Karen Mcdougal, you know, how did all of that enter into this, you know, and, and was this a violation of campaign finance laws or extortion?
Speaker 3:Well, you know, and that's the thing nobody's really talking about. No. Uh, and, uh, the extortion issue, it's just huge to me because the fact that I think Tucker Carlson brought it up once, but nobody's talking about it. And, uh, to me as a criminal defense attorney who's dealt with professionals who are facing extortion, yeah. Um, it's a common situation that happens quite often to successful individuals. So let's just take a look at New York law. Okay. New York Penal Law, defining a lawn, the code extortion, uh, the proper term legal term for black male as drafted in the European law is extortion. Quoting a section one 55.05 larceny defined, a person steals property and commits Larsony with the intent to deprive another of property or to appropriate the same property. Would it be a third person you wrongfully cakes wrongfully obtains by extortion, uh, that property, a person of change property by extortion or blackmail to use the more common term right when he compels or induces another person to deliver such property to himself or to a third person? My means of instilling in him a fear that if the property is not so delivered, the actor or another will section five expose a secret or publicized and assertive fact, whether true or false, tending to new subject, some person to hatred, contempt or ridiculing or perform any other act which would not itself materially benefit the actor, but which is calculated to Herman other person materially with respect to his health, safety, business calling career, financial condition, reputation or personal relationships. NIESR felonies.
Speaker 4:This sounds like someone will come out in a Rico trial or a mafia trial. It's extortion, right?
Speaker 3:Uh, and uh, you know, so these, and these are Class III, d c felonies, they're different felonies. They run from one, one, one to three years, up to some in some cases, one of the third to eight and a third to 25 years in prison. They were classified as e d c B felonies under the New York Penal Statutes. Wow. So what you've got here is a situation where stormy Daniels and the other woman Karen Mcdougal, uh, come in and say, look, we had sex with you, Mr. Trump. You better pay up or we're going to publish this information. And uh, that's blackmail. It's just plain and simple. Now, does that mean the, the person who's being blackmailed has a choice to make there? They can a do nothing. See what happens, right? B, they can pick up the phone and call the police or have their attorney called the police, see they can, uh, cave and come to some sort of civil settlement with the extortionist or black male, black male person. So that's really the, the different ones. Uh, they can do one of those things. So what we've had is over the years, uh, we've had this situation where clients will come in and said, you know, I'm being extorted, I met somebody on craigslist or I met somebody at a wedding or whatever and this is what happened and uh, we decide how to handle it. Now the way, one way to handle it is through a civil settlement. How do you do a civil settlement? Well, civil settlement is done by paying the person off with a civil agreement that says everybody is going to be quiet. Non Disclosure Agreement and disclosure agreement. Okay. Is this form of a civil settlement. And example would be in this, not in this context would be, suppose you've got a situation where you have an employee who in deciles funds and a, the employer finds out about it and the employee says, look, I'm really sorry. Please don't prosecute me. I'll pay the money back. I'll pay it off over the next 90 days. Let's enter a civil settlement plus I'll pay some extra money or I'll do x, Y, and z. You can draft that up into a civil settlement. Everybody can sign it. And there's a civil settlement, right? That tends to avoid prosecution for or deter prosecution if all the parties agree, but there's a big button you can't usually is usually is you can't stop the government from prosecuting you. For instance. You can't stop the government from prosecuting someone for blackmailing another individual. Even if they reach a civil settlement. Why? Yeah, because it's not a civil settlement says Trump versus stormy Daniels for instance. Right? Private persons, but here the government is concerned with the commission of crimes. If you go to somebody and say, we slept together last year, now I want$100,000 or I'm going to tell everybody about it. Right. That's extortion, arguably. So there, if you do a civil settlement, that's all fine and wonderful, but it doesn't erase the extortion.
Speaker 2:I was going to say, because there's a, there's a, there's a difference when we hear about civil cases and criminal cases. Yeah, so the, the, the, the civil case is basically a business deal, if you will,
Speaker 3:between private parties negotiating money, but there's still the criminal side. But here you've got someone demanding money who's blackmailing somebody to do the things that are illegal under the statute, under the New York penal code. So there a crime is being committed. There's probable cause to believe that the crimes being committed by the extortionists, in this case, the two women coming forward demanding money in exchange for not harming Donald Trump's hush money. Hush money. Yeah. Right. So what do you do about that? Well, you can come into this, you can come to an agreement and pay this person money as Donald Trump or the person being extorted and craft a settlement agreement. But that can't stop the government from prosecuting if they choose to. There's a reason why
Speaker 2:does, who would bring, if you decide on a civil settlement, um, don't, do you need a complainant, if you will, to make as to let law enforcement know that a crime was committed or if law enforcement found aerobatic and they say, wait a minute, this is blackmail.
Speaker 3:Correct. If law enforcement finds out about it, they can investigate it, right? They have, they have a duty to investigate crime. And so when they can come and say is, is, look, crime's been committed, we're gonna investigate this and your civil subtle, that's fine, but it can't stop the government from investigating crime. You can't settle something civilly to deter the government from investigating a crime that's been committed. Huh. You can't do that. Right. So there's a reason why it's here in Georgia. It's the state of Georgia versus x right here in New York up in New York. It's the people of New York versus why in the United States system is the United States versus so and so. You can't stop the United States or the people, the state of New York or the state of Georgia from prosecuting a blackmailer for committing a crime. Just because the person who's being blackmailed arguably, Yup. Chose to fold and come up with a civil settlement and pay money under an extortionist demand that is covered by a civil settlement. Interesting. Yeah. That's, that is the government's job to investigate crime and make that decision. It's the police and the prosecutor, not private parties.
Speaker 2:Interesting. So in this big now it's interesting because it sounds like it's torsion to me.
Speaker 3:It looks like, it looks like extortion to me as well.
Speaker 2:All right, well we're talking about, um, about also coming up, we're going to be talking about, you know, Dee the Wiki leaks and, uh, when did people know about wikileaks? What did they do about it? Is that opposition research and also what are the alleged perjury charges going to be that have been referred on pond Michael Cohen to the DOJ for alleged perjury by two Republican representatives this past Thursday, the day after the hearings, all that coming up, arrested with Mike Bruxton criminal defense attorney Dan kind of wait on him to talk one at a six seven. This is arrested with Mike Brooks and Atlanta criminal defense attorney Dan Conaway. Thanks everybody for joining us on our restaurant. We've been breaking down the, the hearing where Michael Cohen was in front of the House Oversight Committee, answering questions from, uh, the, uh, Democrats and Republicans about, got a little bit, a little bit about everything about, uh, there was a lot lies, you know, but got down where they were starting to asking him questions about Russian collusion and some of the, some things about wikileaks and Julian Assange and what he knew, what he didn't know, who knew what when, and everything else. And then on Thursday, the GOP referred, uh, Michael Cohen to the Department of Justice for allege perjury during that hearing. So let's talk about the Russian collusion questions firsthand. You know, when, when asked, he basically said he didn't know anything about Mr Troy. Did President Trump, you know, involved in any Russian collusion? There was no, no, no, no. But what about, what about the, the wikileaks?
Speaker 3:Well, the Wiki leaks, and it's funny because the two go hand in glove together. Yeah. Um, is that, um, there's an issue there. And let me kind of put it like that. Sure. Uh, let's assume, let's take two scenarios. Uh, we've got, uh, two very real scenarios. The first one is, is was he, let's us, let's just put it this way. Let's assume for a minute that the emails were stolen by somebody. Let's assume that the emails were actually stolen by Russian operatives, stolen, hacked, and stolen by Russian opposite. Okay. Uh, which is possible, right? That's the storyline. I haven't seen any evidence one way or another. I'm not involved in case, I don't know. Right. So I have no clue. Let's assume for a minute that's actually the case. It's not some guys in an Idaho playing on his computer, uh, you know, it was, it's actually Russian operatives. He did. Okay. Then all the information comes over to Wiki leaks. Well, um, the issue there is under law is Trump a co conspirator in the theft of those emails belonging to the DNC and Hillary Clinton. And let's stick with the DNC. Okay. Um, okay, so the question there is, you know, is he someone somehow a coconspirator? Well, if you find out about it through a third party and says, Woo, that's great news. Right? But that's all he knows, right? That's not a crime that's being excited about the fact that he might have, there might be some dirt that Julian Assange might dump into the, into the public world.
Speaker 2:Right. And they brought Roger Stone's name into it, who's now, you know, he's waiting awaiting to see what the government's going to do with him, you know, and, and what did he know and when did he know it and did he, was this, you know, a lot of people were saying, well, just the mere fact that a, you know, there was a had a meeting or there was no, those were stolen or he might've had some information. Some people were saying, well, maybe it's stopped. Just you could just figure it. It's opera, you know, opposition research,
Speaker 3:right. And being the theft of the emails is a crime. It was called computer trespass. There other crimes that cover that. Right. But being happy about the fact that they're stolen information out there to now a third party is going to publish, supposedly Julian Assange through wikileaks through a dumb is not a crime. It means you're excited that bad information is going to come out against your opponent in an election. So now there one issue and that is uh, apparently, and I don't know this, haven't seen it, but let's assume for a minute and this is the argument being made that Donald Trump, uh, argue that Donald Trump answered no with his attorney when he responded to Mueller's questions with respect to, did you know anything ahead of time about the wiki leaks slump or things like that? Something like that.
Speaker 2:W but if he, if he hit wasn't sure. And you know the, the, there, there might be any answered. Well no he wasn't. He wanted to know for sure then
Speaker 3:these probably okay. But suppose Roger Stone comes back six months from now and says, well no, he told, I told him directly. I told him directly, I heard the conversation, this is what was said,
Speaker 2:right? Cause Code one apparel. It was in a room and there was a concept know when there was a, a supposedly a conference call and he had the, you know, the speaker phone and he was using and use on a regular basis.
Speaker 3:So we don't know, but could that be a violation from the point of view? The Trump is giving sworn statements, uh, process crime answered for arguably possibly. Yes. Are you possibly know? We don't know enough at this point to know, but that's floating around out there.
Speaker 2:Right. Well, and what are the other things too about this notorious Trump tower meeting? Was that Michael Cohen said that he was in the Oval Office and Don[inaudible], don Jr came in and went behind a desk and whispered something to him. It all, and he wasn't sure exactly what it was, but it was some, maybe, you know, it's set up, you know, a meeting. Who knows what that was about. You know,
Speaker 3:Harlem does all that kind of stuff is that you're getting into all this speculation, a lot of which, if I'm the judge, I don't allow him because there's just a tremendous amount of, well, it's almost like, you know, the game of telephone where somebody is saying this. I'm just saying this to say that hearsay or it's not particularly reliable and it's just not, it's not great evidence. So I don't know. And I don't know obviously how trier of fact would look at it, but to me it's not particularly convincing evidence of much of anything, especially based upon whom the witnesses, there's a part of the Russian collusion issue. There's another thing too. He did respond, meaning, um, Cohen, yeah, the interest. Someone specifically to questions posed to him about the collision issue, which is the whole point of the Mueller investigation. Right. Uh, one, uh, he's stated an equivocal Bme Cohen. He's never been to the Czech Republic and the dossier, supposedly he was right to his new knowledge of Donald Trump colluding with Russia. Three no knowledge of a tape is this thing of Trump, um, doing anything with Russian prostitutes, the pee tape. Right, right. All this kind of stuff. And so he in a way undercut some of the Mueller investigation stuff by stating unequivocably that he's not part of all that. Now is he being truthful or not? He has credibility, problems being comb. We don't know. So we've got potentially false statements, perjury based on Trump's answers to Mueller's written questions. They're going to definitely be looking at that. Uh, you definitely need corroboration from other witnesses and from documents. Otherwise Cohen's testimony, in my opinion, is worth nothing or close to nothing. It doesn't allow for probable cause. Yeah. Three, it appears, and it appeared to me as somebody who's a trial lawyer to look like a political circus yesterday. And quite frankly, we're both sides were trying to throw dirt on the other. Right. And that's just not the way that our legal process specimens.
Speaker 2:Well what about now
Speaker 3:that you know, the, the House Oversight Committee Republicans on Thursday referred, um, Michael Cohen to the Justice Department for alleged perjury claiming that he lied during sworn testimony before the panel and, uh, and the number of issues including his, his ambitions to work in the clump it Trump and the Trump administration and a contact with foreign entities. What, what could happen with that? Well, yeah, the problem you've got here is you've got a lawyer who has been converted into a witness, um, against his former client and, uh, and you know, that's not the way life is supposed to work. Right. Um, under very limited circumstances, you can have that, but it's not supposed to like the crime fraud exception, for example. Yeah. Um, but in this particular situation, I don't know, it seems to me that you've got so many problems with this. I can tell you that as a criminal defense attorney cross examining, uh, Mister Colin in a formal setting, meaning in a, in a courtroom. Yeah. Or if we ever got through an impeachment process where Mr. Trump, uh, was tried in the Senate, right. Um, under those types of circumstances, um, you could just have a field day Oh, absolutely. With, with, with, with Mr. Cohen and all the problems that are there. And so therefore, um, I don't see him as a credible witness interest. You don't see this as a critical case. I see way too many problems with it, but, and what I see is something that really does need to await the Mueller report coming out. Yep. And further investigation.
Speaker 2:Well, we'll keep an eye on this and see whether or not the charges that are being given to the Goj by the two members, if that has any legs or not. Thanks for joining us again. We'll see you next Saturday on arrested with Mike. Perfect criminal but defense attorney Dan Conaway
Speaker 1:on the new talk. What a six. Seven. Thanks for listening to arrested with Mike Brooks and Atlanta criminal defense attorney Dan Conaway. While this show provides general information, it does not constitute legal advice. The best way to get guidance on your specific legal issue is to contact a lawyer for more information or to schedule a meeting with an attorney. Please visit Conaway and strickler.com.