Judge holds Trump in contempt for violating gag order in hush money trial
Prosecutors from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office accused Trump of violating the gag order numerous times since it went into effect.
The judge presiding over Donald Trump’s hush money case on Tuesday held the former president in criminal contempt over a series of posts on Truth Social that he said violated a gag order barring any attacks on jurors and witnesses.
Judge Juan Merchan ruled Trump in contempt for nine violations of his gag order, with a fine of $1,000 for each instance. The order prohibits the former president from "making or directing others to make public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses concerning their potential participation in the investigation or in this criminal proceeding," and "public statements about any prospective juror or any juror."
Merchan had indicated on April 23 that he was not impressed by the arguments from the defense, telling one of Trump's attorneys that he was “losing all credibility” when he suggested that Trump was exercising caution to comply with the gag order.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/judge-holds-trump-contempt-violating-gag-order-hush-money-trial-rcna149101Open linkView original on lemmy.world
Put. Him. In. A. Holding. Cell.
50,000 to 60,000.
What about just one really big wasp?
50,000 wasp sized Trumps or 1 Trump sized wasp?
Then. Set. It. All. On. Fire.
And. Make. It. Televised.
Oh shit. I'd PPV the hell out of that.
Honestly?
The wasps deserve better.
Nah man, fuck wasps. Trump and Wasps deserve each other, and I mean both the Creature and the Christian
Wasps are living things. They likely experience pain and distress; i could never wish those on anything capable of feeling them. Señor racismo, on the other hand... maybe we could compromise and seal him in with some coronavirus to study its mutations?
Wasps are one of the more cruel and fucked up insects out there, they'd probably get along fine with Cheeto Benito
So still two classes of humanity above dorito Mussolini, then?
Fair enough I guess xD
make it "TVs tuned to MSNBC"
Meidas Touch YT channel
In a hole preferably
Make him pick up litter along the highway.
So he's going to jail right? Held in jail until his next trial date, like what normally happens to people held in contempt?
Next time, we totally mean it this time!
Stop, or I'll say stop again!
I've written a strongly worded letter, don't make address this envelope!
This is a joke right?
The maximum fine in NY for this is $1,000 per infraction. If it continues, the judge could sentence jail time but the fine would remain the same.
So it's basically designed for rich people to be to ignore?
Sure is looking that way, isn't it?
The judge addressed that concern specifically and said that when $1k isn't sufficient to cow a contemnor, detention should be imposed.
This is key. If he jailed him right away, his attorneys would call for a mistrial saying the judge was biased against him and they would probably succeed in getting the trial thrown out. It would still go on with another judge, but when the tactic is delay, they win.
This is the first step towards jail for contempt. There can be no doubt Trump is maliciously violating the gag order.
That said, I have little doubt some 11th hour fuckery will happen to prevent him from being jailed.
The Supreme Court will stop all of the democracy dismantling they are doing to say the do-nad can't be imprisoned.
It's like handicap parking spots, it's basically just a super expensive reserved parking spot that every parking lot is legally required to have.
Yes.
Just like all the other laws.
Any criminal law punishable with a fine only (and bail in general) is fucked up because justice is supposed to be about applying fairness under universal laws and our means are not fairly distributed.
https://law.justia.com/codes/new-york/2022/jud/article-19/751/ has it also starting with 30 days max along with the 1k & it would be interesting to see how often those charges come with jail time.
And the judge acknowledged that point in his statement. Pointed out that other types of violations allow the guilty party's wealth to be taken into account, but this charge doesn't. Also pointed out that ignoring this sentence and doing future violations are mush more likely to lead to jail time.
.
Despite Trump's whining about everything being unfair to him, and the public saying this is a slap on the wrist, the judge is taking the legally appropriate and legally required steps.
Correct. Merchan is smart to stay by the book in order to prevent providing cause for Trump’s defense to claim mistrial. The prosecution recommended the maximum fine, which was honored. Merchan then set the grounds for possible jail time for future infractions.
Isn't there already another gag violation hearing on the docket for violations done while awaiting the first gag violation hearing and/or when we were awaiting the decision from the first violation hearing?
Yes. It's unclear if the remaining 4 infractions that will be heard on Thursday will be grouped with these first 10 or if they will be ruled on separately. My bet is that since these happened before he issued his warning to Trump about future infractions resulting in incarceration, they will also carry the maximum $1000 penalty if found to have been violated. But from today on Trump is officially on notice that any violation of the gag order will be a grounds for imprisonment.
Yes and no.
The amount is insignificant in the monetary sense, but shows the court can actually enforce a gag order. Hopefully further violations result in far more significant contempt punishments such as throwing his ass in jail, but it is a start.
It’s not enforcement if he can pay it with pocket change, it’s just a slight annoyance. Enforcement would be taking his means of breaking the gag order away (his access to social media).
Has he paid? He hasn't paid E Jean Carroll, and that was months ago. Hasn't even posted bond for his fraud verdict.
I'm pretty sure both of the bonds have been posted for the Carroll appeals.
Wasn't the appeal denied? Doesn't he have to pay now?
FOR REALS this time, if you do it AGAIN,
there will be consequenceswe'll tell you to stop again!I know this is a popular thing to be angry about, but this time there was an actual fine. The consequences are being ratcheted up. The judge is just taking as much care as possible to make sure that all the "t"s are crossed and "i"s dotted along the way, otherwise he risks the whole trial being thrown out in the end. Look at some of the other high-profile "this rich guy's guilty as sin but got off anyway" cases, they often boil down to some screw-up that doesn't disprove the overall case but still invalidates the trial. Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby pop to mind.
A $9,000 fine is hardly a consequence for the rich.
Yes, but as I explained, the judge is proceeding by steps up the ladder of consequences. The next time Trump violates a gag order he can now say "I have demonstrated that fines are insufficient, and so I'm moving on to jail time."
The judge is limited - $1000 per violation is the maximum that can be imposed.
Sadly, it's a limitation of the legal system. The judge even admitted in his ruling on this that he acknowledges that the monetary punishment is inadequate considering Donald Trump's wealth and status. He threatened jail time for future incidents.
The point is that as much as any sane person wants to see Trump behind bars, if you just skip straight to locking him up, he will use that as grounds for a mistrial. I'd rather see justice done slowly, him given every warning and every opportunity to correct his bad behavior. Yes, it's not fair that he gets treated with kid gloves time and time again while a street level drug dealer would just get held without bond, say nothing of what would happen if they were to be charged with criminal contempt, but without going through the whole process Trump will just use the temporary incarceration to paint himself as a victim of political persecution and pivot it to his advantage when he inevitably appeals the guilty verdict.
True. But if he continues to ignore the court despite the maximum non-custodial penalty the judge will have cause to have him detained.
They probably can't logistically put him in a cell, but they can probably give him house arrest and have the internet disconnected.
Ive heard this for every single trial trump has faced. This strategy isnt doing shit but making sure trump is comfortable before facing no consequences yet again.
This is the first criminal trial. You haven't heard it in this regard before.
And unlike prior trials it started with fines rather than just warnings. The maximum allowed fine, even!
I mean it should have been criminal consequences for the russian collusion and ukraine blackmail cases. But both times I was assured they're just making sure they handle everything spotlessly to ensure he faces...and it's gone.
The complexity is crazy. The federal system failing to hold him accountable because of politics is disgraceful. Thankfully he can't avoid the States legal system that same way.
man even this exact case has warped beyond the boundaries of whats supposed to be law to protect Trump. We already got a guilty verdict that Trump ordered his lawyer to pay this girl, but only the lawyer faced consequences. this shit's in real jeopardy of hitting up against statute of limitations for a crime committed in 2016.
$1000 fine per incident? Can Trump wipe his diapers with a thousand dollar bill before giving it to the court? When will this asshat have real accountability?
Statutory maximum, he can't legally start with worse. He threatened jail for future contempt. And I hope he holds that promise!
He won't.
$9,000? Fucking seriously?
Unfortunately, that is probably the statute. It sucks that we don't scale up fines based on wealth.
In Sweden (I think), speeding tickets are based on how much money you have. A person making $50k a year will pay a lower speeding ticket compared to a billionaire going the same speed.
As they say if the punishment is a fine it's aimed at the poor.
And if a company does it, it is a business expense.
It's the maximum penalty, and the judge acknowledged that he had no control over it and that he wished it scaled with the contemnor's ability to pay.
Finland has that rule, not Sweden
Not entirely sure about speeding tickets specifically, but many fines in Sweden also scale with income.
Yeah, there's the type of fine called dagsböter (day fine) scaled by income. It's common but not the only type used.
@Bassman1805 @MicroWave New York law $1K per instance. I would guess this is a warning shot and if #djt keeps violating the gag order, we'll see #incarceration. #Merchan is being very careful and not giving any wiggle room for an appeal.
...for small change. This is not going to stop anything. It just gave his methods a (cheap) price tag.
It has to be reasonable and in line with practice. Trump is both like and unlike everyone else that's gone through that courtroom. You have to treat him with kid gloves, let him keep pulling on the rope, then hang him with FAFO consequences fully justified and above reproach.
Stop projecting
From what I have read, conditions of his release from the other trials include not committing ANY crime. Criminal contempt triggers this and Judge Chutkin is the most likely to jail him. Now...odds on that ACTUALLY happening...
That's an interesting thought. It will never happen, of course, but if she decides he violated the terms of his release she could remand him to jail until trial. If that happens, then all of the work Trump has done to delay his other trials until after the election would end up costing him big time.
0.000000000% unfortunately
There's a 1 somewhere at the end of a nearly infinite list of zeroes.
After a googolplex of zeros
I think you dropped a 0.
I'm sure he's shaking in his boots.
Mostly because he's a fat worthless fuckstain, not because he's scared of a 9,000 dollar fine.
I wonder if he's gonna pull some sort of lame stunt, like pay it in pennies, or in 23 pairs of Trump Sneakers
Seething with anger, more likely.
It's funny his supporters don't realize they're supporting their own demises as well. It's perhaps the only silver lining to the nightmare.
Biden is not amazing, but he's still at least doing his job. Trump wasn't interested in actually doing the job, and wouldn't have been capable of it if he was interested. Even putting aside Trumps corruption and collusion, he just wouldn't be good at or capable of the job this time again. Even if he wasn't specifically trying to end democracy and switch us to a dictatorship, he still just wouldn't be a good president, as evidenced by the last time he was president. He isn't capable of doing the job.
Ah, you didn't even read the post. Maybe too many words. I'll fix it. Biden not good, Trump still more bad. We no get choice.
Oh look, the cattle cry of the dumbest shit stains on the planet. Fuck your makeup wearing fuhrer.
Donald isn't winning. You filthy anti-american traitors will cry. We the majority will laugh.
Not hush money. Election interference.
What a coincidence! I find him contemptible, too
Quick, everyone purchase the Ultimate Beach Set to help the god emperor out. /s
Eighty five American dollars for that? To what amounts to probably $3 in wholesale crap from a container drop?
1K??? AHAHAHAHAHAAAHAHHHAAHAAAA
OMG this is hilarious. I officially now have more contempt for this judge than I do for Trump. And that's really saying something.
That's the maximum non-custodial sentence
So in other words, the fine needs to be a percentage of wealth/income, not a flat rate.
So? Lock him up.
There is a possibility that he might be despite the monetary punishment. Trump just committed Criminal Contempt and has thereby violated his pre-trial release conditions on nearly all of his other trials. It's within their rights now to lock him up until the other trials commence and conclude.
I'm tempering my expectations here, because those judges would still have to hold a hearing to give Trump's legal team a chance to argue that he did not violate his per-release agreement. Nevertheless, it's on the table now, all that remains is finding a judge with enough of a spine to uphold the rule of law equally.
Him being put on notice in this specific trial is a good thing. The next step after this is a jail cell if he keeps running his mouth. Hopefully that'll mean this entire process will be a lot quieter now with fewer outbursts and interruptions. Although. a lot of pundits are speculating that Trump will start toeing the line now so that he only has one infraction of his gag order at a time to intentionally get thrown in jail so he can turn it into a political stunt and garner sympathy. It's not clear if he'll get the maximum 30 days or not, but it doesn't really matter, he'll try and spend as little time in jail as possible, but make it seem like he is a victim of political persecution.
It's the maximum penalty, and the judge acknowledged that he had no control over it and that he wished it scaled with the contemnor's ability to pay.
One way to look at it. Another is that Trump is not being treated any different than someone else when it comes to the fine. If he keeps doing it and the judge locks him up, everyone knows the judge was fair.
Go do the same shit and see what happens to you.
So $9K?
For the layman, that’s a lot, but for Trump?
It’s the legal maximum fine for this, and there are still three other charges that will be discussed this week. It’s very much possible that Trump may see the inside of a jail cell, but that remains to be seen.
And even though it seems like a tiny slap on Trump's tiny wrist, it's still an escalation. So next time Trump flagrantly violates gag orders the judge can escalate more. If there's an appeal it'll be important to be able to show the judge didn't jump straight to the harshest penalties.
Let's be real, that's probably a lot for Trump right now, too. The man's broke.
Lol he's not paying. Republicans gave him unfettered access to their election campaign funds
Drain em Donny. Keep going.
His stake in his "media" company is (nonsensically) still worth billions of dollars right now. He probably won't be able to cash all of that out if he wanted to, but he is definitely not broke.
I’m sure Trump doesn’t pay anyways. He’ll use the money donated to him by Cleatus the slack jawed yokel.
Bitty balls are better than no balls i guess