Trump tried to 'corrupt' his own attorney in Mar-a-Lago case: prosecutors
Donald Trump tried to corrupt his own attorney in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case, according to prosecutors.
A court filing provides new details of Trump's alleged efforts to hide classified documents from investigators and his own attorney while allegedly pretending to cooperate with a National Archives demand that he return highly sensitive materials he took from his time in the White House.
"When presented with a grand jury subpoena demanding the return of the remaining documents bearing classification markings, Trump attempted to enlist his own attorney in the corrupt endeavor, suggesting that he falsely tell the FBI and grand jury that Trump did not have any documents, and suggesting that his attorney hide or destroy documents rather than produce them to the government," the document states.
However, the attorney refused to go along with the scheme, so prosecutors said Trump tried to deceive him. It detail in the filing was first reported by Newsweek.
"Failing in his effort to corrupt the attorney, Trump enlisted his trusted bodyman, co-defendant Waltine Nauta, in a scheme to deceive the attorney by moving boxes to conceal his [Trump's] continued possession of classified documents," the filing states. "As a result, Trump, through his attorney, again returned only a portion of the classified documents in his possession while falsely claiming that his production was complete."
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Trump, Nauta and property manager Carlos De Oliveira then tried to destroy CCTV video that showed them hiding the boxes, prosecutors said.
"The obstructive conduct even persisted from there. In June 2022, knowing that he had arranged for Nauta to move boxes to conceal them from Trump's attorney, and knowing that the government had subpoenaed the security video footage that would reveal that surreptitious box movement, Trump, now joined by not only Nauta but also co-defendant Carlos De Oliveira, attempted to have the information-technology manager at Mar-a-Lago delete the video footage that would show the movement of boxes," the filing added.