Trump Trial Mock Jury (Episode 386)

In this episode, listeners serve as a mock jury to take us inside a simulated jury room where they deliberate the facts of the Trump vs. NY case as we listen in. See how a jury of regular voters would sift through the testimony and evidence to come to a verdict.

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Episode Transcript

(00:15):
Welcome to the More Perfect Union,the podcast that offers real debate without the
Hate'm Kevin Kelton and tonight we havea very special More Perfect Union podcast because
we are doing a mock jury deliberationof the Trump trial that is currently going
on in New York in Manhattan tonight. We have about ten people here that

(00:35):
are going to serve as our jurorsand we are going to listen to them
as they deliberate as if they werethe real jury in New York based on
the facts and evidence as they knowit. So before we get to them,
let me, of course introduce mycompadres here, Rebecca Cushmeider. Hello
there, and this evening, Iwill be playing the role of a prosecuting
attorney, which I believe is areference to First Wives Club, where Goldie

(01:00):
Hans's character said, you start outis babe district attorney and dead and that
is an actress's career. We'll explainthat in a minute. And Greg Medusac
is here. I had a ridiculouslybusy week This week. I had applied
to be the Libertarian candidate and Igot almost as many votes as RFK and
Donald Trump, so you know,And DJ MacGuire. Good evening everyone,

(01:26):
I will be playing his honor tonight. Okay, so let me again explain
what we're doing here as we dothis podcast. The actual jury in the
Trump trial in New York has notgotten the case yet. They are still
listening to closing arguments. But wethought it would be interesting to have our
own mock jury, to get insidea jury room and see how regular people

(01:51):
would evaluate the evidence as they knowit and then come to some kind of
a verdict or come to, youknow, whatever decision they come to.
Now, we couldn't get twelve peopletonight, so we have ten people on
this particular jury, but we're goingto use that as a full jury box
in our case. So with thatin mind, DJ is going to be

(02:13):
the judge and give jury instructions.Rebecca is going to be the prosecuting attorney
if we ever need to go toher for specifics on her case. Greg
Metusak will be playing the role ofthe defense attorney. So getting into it
now, what we're going to dois pretend that this is like the final
moments of court. DJ is goingto read a short what we're calling jury

(02:38):
instructions, and then we're going toretire to our deliberations. So with that
I turned this over to Judge maguire. Ladies, gentlemen, and non binaries
of the jury, I remind youthat your purpose here is to evaluate the
trial evidence as you know it andcome to a verdict. You are not
here to vote for president. Youare not here to make a political statement.

(02:59):
This is not a partisan exercise toprove a point. You are to
deliberate with each other openly and ingood faith. Be as passionate as you
like, but please keep it calmand civil, even and especially if your
individual thoughts are challenged by others.I also direct you not to consider anything
but the evidence as you know it. Your opinions on whether this case should

(03:19):
or shouldn't have been brought are irrelevant. That is not the role of the
petitury. Your role is to waythe evidence presented in nothing else, not
expert opinions you're for it on TV, Not expert opinions you've heard on a
podcast. No matter how brilliant,deliberate fairly and objectively deliberate on the evidence,
and I wish you the best ofluck. So we are now in

(03:40):
the jury room. I'm going toserve as the four person. Okay,
The first witness for the prosecution wasa man named David Pecker. He's the
publisher of the National Inquirer, andthe basic points that he testified to were
that he told Donald Trump and MichaelCohen that he would be their eyes and
ears of the campaign. He plantedand embellished false stories about Trump's campaign opponents

(04:08):
in the National Inquirer. He publishedstories at Trump's behest about Ted Cruz,
Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, andof course Hillary Clinton. And he testified
that he ran and approved what theycall catch and kill schemes on Karen McDougall,
who was the other woman that Trumpis alleged to have had an affair

(04:28):
with, and on a doorman atTrump Tower who there was a scandalous story
about and with the knowledge and approvalof Donald Trump. David Pecker said that
he purchased those stories with the expressintent of not publishing them and having the
people sign an NDA so they couldnever talk about these scandals. So with

(04:51):
that, does anybody have anything theywant to say about David Pecker's testimony?
I just have a question. Didn'the wasn't their testimony that he had a
meeting with Trump about this, thathe would be the eyes and the ears.
I remember something, okay, Sohe actually had like a face to
face meeting with him. To myunderstanding, yes, does anybody else have

(05:12):
any thoughts on that? As Ilistened to mister Pecker testify, I wasn't
sure why he was there, andI still don't know why, and that's
some complication would be helpful. Ibelieve my opinion as Durr is he was
there too. One established that theTrump campaign was worried about these various scandal

(05:36):
stories, that they were trying tosuppress them, that he actively worked with
Cohen and Trump to suppress the KarenMcDougall story. I assume everybody knows who
that is, and that my understandingof the testimony is they wanted him to
do the same thing with Stormy Daniels. But Pecker had already laid out one

(05:57):
hundred and thirty thousand dollars for KarenMcDougall. He balked at doing it again.
He said he did not want tobe in business with a porn star,
and so he said to Michael Cohen, if you want to buy her
story, you should do it.Yourself. So that was sort of the
impetus of where the I want touse the right word here the plan went

(06:18):
between Don Spears. Can I sayhe was a conspiracy Well, okay,
we can use that phrase, butthat was the impetus of it. Loud
you had something to say thanks acouple of things. Do we consider him
a credible witness at all? Second, I think he was there to lay

(06:38):
the paper chain for the money fromone end, who received it, all
the links into who authorized it,and cash signed the check. So yeah,
that's my understanding too. End upat the same place as I started.
Do we believe mister Pecker is acredible witness? Really quickly? I

(07:00):
mean, I'll tell answer. Ifound Pecker completely credible, But again,
don't I don't didn't see what hehad anything to do with the check.
He just sort of like, Idon't want to do this. You go
guy, steal it yourself. Andall the charges are that they didn't do
it themselves correctly, what did itthemselves illegally? So again I'm not sure.
Okay, I think Pecker's testimony shouldhave been five or ten minutes,

(07:23):
But okay, okay, Julie,what Packer's testimony did is he showed that
they were willing to pay one hundredand fifty thousand dollars for Karen McDougall,
thirty thousand dollars for the dorman whosaid that somebody fathered that he fathered a
child with somebody. And what heactually testified to is that he wouldn't pay

(07:46):
for Stormy Daniel's silence because Trump hadnever paid him for the other stories.
He actually didn't have anything to dowith the checks or any of that.
Other witnesses were put on to showthat it came out of accounts and that
Trump signed it. He was moreof to show that Trump was willing to

(08:11):
pay to stop these things from affectinghis campaign. And that's what he testified
to, right, Yeah, AndI want to add one more clarification.
Another thing that was important about misterPecker's testimony is he establishes from his testimony
that they were interested in suppressing allof this evidence not because of Donald Trump's

(08:35):
embarrassment or getting into hot water withhis wife, but that this was explicitly
to help his presidential campaign. Andthat's a key point that we're going to
come back to later on. Eric, are you at a question. Well,
I was going to say. Theother thing I think it helped established
was that Trump was involved in knowingthe process in these first two cases,

(08:58):
and France wants us to believe thathe knew nothing about the Stormy Daniels thing,
which seems a little harder to believebecause they pretty clearly established he knew
about the Karen Dougal story and theDoorman story, so it seems a little
makes it harder to believe he didn'tknow about the Stormy Daniels payment when it

(09:18):
came later. So let's move onto some of the other testimony so we
don't spend too much time on misterPacker. The next witness was a woman
named Rona Graf. She is orwas Donald Trump's secretary. Her testimony,
which was brief, was that sheremembers seeing Stormy Daniels in Trump Tower and

(09:41):
knew who she was. And shetestified that Trump and Melania had a warm
relationship and that Trump respected his wife'sopinion and respected their marriage. Those were
the two takeaways that I thought wereimportant. Does anybody have anything they want
to add on that? I justhave a question, Yeah, when did

(10:01):
she see Stormy at Trump Tower.She testified that she wasn't sure, but
she had a vague memory of seeingher sometime before the presidential election on the
twenty sixth floor of Trump Tower,and at some point she was there to
discuss being on the Celebrity Apprentice.Because there was a contention, and this

(10:24):
is an important point, there wasa contention in the opening statements made by
the defense that Donald Trump maintains thatthere was never a sexual relationship between Stormy
Daniels, that he didn't know whothis woman was. The reason why I
asked that question is like when wasthe affair? Like what year was it?
Like two thousand and five, yes, two thousand and six, Okay,

(10:48):
yes, so ten years later,Okay, I'm just trying to get
it clear in my head. Okay, to give graft, you know,
the at her word and say that, let's say Trump did respect his marriage
with Milania, that does speak tohis claim that I was doing it to

(11:09):
protect my marriage. I think somethingcame out later that a lot of stuff
came out later that it was clearlythe election, because it was you know,
yeah, maybe that's part of it, but also more of the election,
including I really hope that this wouldcome out after, let's delay the
payment till after. You keep hearingafter after. So it kind of makes

(11:31):
oh, his love for his wifekind of fall into the background and he
you know, and both can betrue. But we're going to prove that
the second part is true. Yes, the stuff about his respecting his wife
is irrelevant. He may have respectedher and still had an affair with Stormy
Daniels and want to cover it up. And the reason for covering it up

(11:54):
was brought up specifically. That's whythey brought Hope Hicks into the mix,
and Hope Hicks testified under oath thateverything that was done at that period of
time, everything was aimed at gettingDonald Trump elected. It's subjective anyway,
right, Like I don't really careif she thinks something or whatever. I
mean, I don't know what thatworn't even means respect, So to me,

(12:18):
it's kind of like it's an opinionof hers that I don't really need
to pay attention to. Okay,I'm building an argument here. Did we
agree that we thought mister Pecker wascredible? I did anybody else? Yep?
Yeah? I did? I did. I read then same question for

(12:39):
this lady. I think in theend, the two things that are named
of the damning evidence. She sawStormy Daniels in Trump in Trump Tower ten
years later that acknowledges the relationship.It might not have been ten years later.
I might have misspoken that, butat some time after the alleged sexual

(13:01):
encounter, I thought that only twentysixteen. Yeah, okay, it might
have been. I'm not sure.I honestly, I'm not sure. And
by the way, her opinion aboutwhether Donald Trump respected Millennia or not,
it's just her opinion. I mean, she wasn't in their hotel rooms and
things. Whether the affair happened ornot is completely irrelevant. It doesn't matter

(13:22):
at all because whether they had theaffair or not, they were trying to
cover it up. And honestly,to me, it almost speaks more that
it was true. If it wasn'ttrue, he'd be less likely to try
to cover it up if it wasfor Millennia, because if it's not true,
then there's less reason cover it upfor your wife, versus if it
is true, then cover it upfor your campaign. So it's definitely that's

(13:43):
the other piece I saw there,Lou you had something you wanted to say,
Okay, where I'm going is notto have an argument, is to
build a logical decision. So ifwitness won was credible, before we leave
this point, can we agree thiswitness was credible regardless of whether she had

(14:05):
a vague notion or she we cannotdespond to find what she calls respect Is
she credible? All of this goesto building a pattern of behavior and previous
acts. The details are pretty muchimmaterial. What this is going to lead

(14:26):
to is a chain for the decisionto take place, to have a conspiracy
to use this election money to payoff a catch and kill story. That's
the case. Did they know didthey conspire to use election funds for non
election reasons? It's just a misdemeanorif they fight it wrong, but when

(14:52):
they do it in the cause ofan election, it becomes a felony.
And that most of testimony, asI see it, built a pathway for
the conspiracy and the money to travelback and forth between these people. So
in the end, from the evidencepresented, I think we need to decide

(15:15):
as we go along, is eachpiece of evidence and each witness credible say,
because other witnesses will lend so youcan't say just from that person testifying
that, Oh, I've decided thatthey're credible, and that's actually not how
it works in a jury deliberation.I've actually sat on a jury. How

(15:37):
it works is other witnesses might makeit so you feel that way. So
it's not fair to say you needto make a decision right now on whether
you think that person is credible becausesomebody else's testimony might make you feel differently.
I agree with Julie because we couldhear I think we should hear all
the evidence. Yeah, I thinkyou're making a very good point, but
I think that we also have tocontinue forward with some of the more substantive

(16:00):
evidence, and then I think thatwe can come back and circle back to
this. Okay. The next witnesswas Hope Hicks. I believe people are
familiar with her. She was theTrump campaign worker and a personal assistant of
his and a good family friend.She said that she was concerned about how
these news stories, the Stormy Danielsstory and the Karen McDougall story would impact

(16:25):
the presidential campaign, and she specificallysaid yes, it was a damaging development
in regards to the campaign. Shealso said that Trump was concerned how the
Karen McDougall story would be viewed byMilania, and she was asked specifically about
the possibility that Michael Cohen. Listen, I'm jumping ahead here. We all

(16:47):
know that one hundred and thirty thousanddollars was paid to this woman's Stormy Daniels
to keep silent. We all knowthat, right. That's established. The
question that the defense has seen deemedto be raising is that Donald Trump was
out of the loop on this andthat Michael Cohen took it upon himself to

(17:08):
pay the one hundred and thirty thousanddollars to Stormy Daniels and help. Hicks
was asked about that theory by theprosecution, and she said to the idea
that Cohen would pay one hundred andthirty thousand dollars to Stormy Daniels out of
the kindness of his own heart,Hicks replied, I would say that that

(17:29):
is out of character from Michael.I don't know Michael to be an especially
charitable person or selfless person. He'sthe kind of person who seeks credit.
So I believe what this piece oftestimony indicates is according to Hope Hicks,
if we believe her testimony It's unlikelythat Michael Cohen decided on his own to

(17:55):
mortgage his home, hiding it fromhis wife to pay off Remy Daniels in
the expectation that Donald Trump was goingto repay him at a later time.
Paul, you had your hand up. Just one thing is that she also
said that everything everybody did at thatpoint in time was aimed at the election.
Nothing was aimed at Malennia Trump.It was I think you're paraphrasing,

(18:21):
but I think that's the essence ofwhat she and paraphrasing. I'm not quoting.
Yeah, do that. He alsocoroborated the meeting between Trump and Pecker
and Cohen because she, I think, was the only one that had gone
in and out outside of those threepeople. So she's the only other person
that can say, yes, theywere talking, and yes they may or

(18:41):
may not have been talking about thisfrom what I remember. She didn't testifies
to say she knew exactly what itwas, but I don't remember exactly.
Okay, let's great, let's keepmoving forward. Also add quickly, and
she said, did she not thatTrump preferred news of the payment after the
election. Yes, he's said toI think it was to her, but
he said to somebody, you know, if this comes out after the election,

(19:04):
we don't even have to pay herbecause at that point it doesn't make
So that's what Hicks testified to.Okay, yeah, I believe it was
her that testified to that. Didthey ask her anything about the tape,
the Access Hollywood tape, That's onething I'm not clear. Yes. Did
she was she was heartbroken when itcame out. Uh. In relation to

(19:25):
how how Trump like did this affectanything about this stuff with Stormy Daniel's,
I don't know if they ever asked. Yes. She essentially testified that once
that came out, the campaign wasin crisis mode and they were very concerned
about his ability, his potential tobe elected, and that they were making
decisions with that in mind. That'scorrect. So let's move on to this

(19:51):
woman. Stormy Daniels Stephanie Clifford isher real name. An adult film actress.
She testified that she met the defendantat a golf tournament in Las Vegas
in around two thousand and five ortwo thousand and six, that she was
invited to dinner with Trump by hisbodyguard, that she was escorted to his

(20:11):
suite where she met where Trump mether in his hotel room in red satin
pajamas. They began to have aconversation, during which, amongst a lot
of things that she testified to,he dangled the possibility of her being on
The Celebrity Apprentice. They talked,and then for whatever reasons, she testified

(20:32):
to the fact that she had sexwith him, and that she also acknowledged
under cross examination that she had latertold a news reporter that they hadn't had
sex. But she said that shehad told that lie because of the NDA
that swore hert to secrecy about thisaffair, because she had taken the money

(20:52):
she was sworn to secrecy, andthat she had fear for her safety if
it was to come out. Thatwas her testimony. Now let's go back
to the jury to see your thoughtson this key witness. Didn't she talk
about the fact that she had beenearlier negotiations like twenty twelve or twenty thirteen,
but somebody came and threatened her ina parking garage. There was testimony

(21:18):
about a threat. I don't knowabout negotiations, but there was testimony that
she that she says she was threatenedat a Parking garage. Yes, Sally,
we haven't heard from you. Isthere anything that you want to add?
You don't have to. I'm justthrowing to you if you want to
talk. Sure, I thought thatI thought that more important than Pecker or

(21:41):
the other lady. That Hope Hickswas so credible, and she wasn't She
didn't want to be there, butshe seemed to be telling the truth.
It was hard for her, andI found her very believable, and I
think it said it everything up tomake Subsequently, Michael Cohen's testimony and Stormy

(22:06):
daniels testimony more credible. Good point, Tony. Do you have any thoughts
on this particular witness. Again,I accept pretty much what she said is
true. I don't really have thatmany questions about the facts, and I
do find her credible. Okay,so let's move on. Obviously a very
important witness Michael Cohen. He wasDonald Trump's attorney and some people called him

(22:30):
the fixer for whatever that word means. He said that Donald Trump directed him
to pay off Stormy Daniels and thatTrump approved the reimbursement plan. He said
that Trump told him just take careof it. He said that Trump approved
the plan to falsify the payment recordsin a January twenty seventeen meeting, which

(22:52):
would have been just days before Trumpbecame president, and then again they had
a meeting to that effect in theOval offe a month after that, so
that would have been in February oftwenty seventy. The repayments were falsely labeled
legal expenses. Coen testified that theywere not legal expenses. Although a portion

(23:14):
of the overall four hundred and twentythousand dollars payment was for his bonus,
his annual bonus, the rest ofit was to pay off other people,
including Stormy Daniels. Trump wrote legalretainer on the eleven check memos, but
they had no retainer, nothing inwriting. And Michael Cohen testified that he

(23:37):
admitted that he stole thirty thousand dollarsfrom the Trump organization in one of those
payments because he felt his annual bonuswas unfairly low, and he admitted that
he had stolen money from that organization. So again, there's a lot more
to discuss with him, but Ithrow it open to you guys this any

(24:00):
other points you want to bring up, or if you want to discuss his
credibility. Now is the time.So it's my understanding those that four hund
twenty thousand they paid him back morethan one hundred and thirty thousand dollars so
that it would account for the taxeshe would have to pay because they were
claiming it his income rather than areimbursement of money he'd paid. And Alan

(24:22):
Weiselberg in that meeting with Trump orNo, he was not in that meeting,
but he did. He actually wasthe architect of the payment plan.
And they have a document with hishandwriting. It says, you know,
one hundred and thirty thousand for StormyDaniels fifty thousand dollars to another company,
Redfinch. Then that added up toone hundred and eighty thousand. Then they

(24:45):
doubled that because Michael Cohen was inthe fifty percent tax bracket, that came
to three hundred and sixty thousand dollars. And then they added on his sixty
thousand dollars annual bonus and that cameto four hundred and twenty thousand dollars.
I'd like to make a legal pointfor you to move on to the next
witness, to say, do youbelieve them did you think they were credible
because it builds the chain of evidence. I think this is a question for

(25:07):
the judge, your honor. Thematter of whether or not a witness is
credible is to be determined by eachand every one of you as individuals,
and by the twelve of you asa group. It is not for me
to decide whether a witness is credibleor not. It is for you to
decide, as members of the jury, whether you find a witness credible or

(25:30):
whether you don't. Okay, withthat in mind, Lou do you find
Michael Cohen credible on some things?Jass on some things? No? Okay?
Anybody else? Addy? Yeah,I you know, there's credibility issues,
of course, but the whole thinggoodreek of credibility issues. But one

(25:51):
thing that verifies what Cohen said,what Hope Hicks is actually verifying. And
she said, he's not the typeof guy to you know, it's out
of a character for him to dosomething for himself. And lo and behold,
he's taken a little extra money becausehe's you know, so he put
it up not as some big tome, as some big scam of like,
how can I go to the troubleof getting a little extra money in

(26:15):
my Christmas bonus. Oh, firstthing, I'll put one hundred and thirty
thousand dollars into a porn star paymentand then I'll get an extra fifty grand.
You know, that seems to belike a verification of validation of his
character by the fact that he wentfor more money. So if there was
anything like he forgot what exactly therewas a prank caller, and there was

(26:37):
a couple texts that he thought,oh I'm talking about this, but it
was about the prank call. Butfor the most part, a lot of
this stuff is validated. I mean, we can't look at Weisselberg's testimony,
but he is in jail. Butoutside of that, he's you know,
there's phone records and emails. Andthen it comes down to the major question,

(26:59):
who did this betch fit? Andthen we look at the Weisselberg document.
We don't need to. And Iwant to point out something either party,
the defense or the prosecution, eitherparty could have called Alan Weisselberg as
a witness. Neither chose to.And Weisselberg's document was there as evidence.

(27:19):
Nobody questions it. So just sothat you know, Drey Foreman since I've
been a forum before. If peoplekeep talking about Weiselberg as foreman, you
need to tell them to stop talkingabout Weisselberg. Yes, he's relevant.
We can talk about the document thatis in evidence. But Alan Weisselberg himself

(27:40):
did not provide any testimony in thisCAXT. Correct, correct, Okay,
we're all in a gratument. Wasby the way, the document was declared
to be Weiseelberg's by a sworn witnesswho knew his writing. Yeah, right,
there's no doubt that Alan Weisselberg wroteout in handwriting the document that outlined
the payments. Okay, I'd liketo say too that I think you'd have

(28:03):
to be kind of out of yourmind to take out a home equity loan
and not tell your wife unless youknew that that money was going to get
paid back, or you might endup pretty divorced pretty quickly. This is
my point as one of the jurors. Although I'm not going to vote at
the end, but since the foreman, I guess I'm part of the jury.

(28:23):
The idea that I mean, Listen, everyone in the world knows that
Donald Trump has some reputation for noteven paying back people that worked for him,
that he has either scammed people outof money entirely or he pressures them
to to reduce the payments that heowes them. I take that as a

(28:44):
fact. You do what you willwith it. The idea that Michael Cohen,
who knew Donald Trump as well asanybody outside of his family, would
take the risk and shelling out onehundred and thirty thousand dollars on the expectation
that he was going to get fullyand burst that to me, makes that
line of thought less credible. That'smy point. Anybody else have anything they

(29:07):
want to say about Michael Colin,about his credibility, about how he impacts
the greater case, I just wantedto say, like, when you're at
a case like this, when you'relooking at it, these are the people
that he surrounded himself with. There'sno easy person outside of maybe Hope Pix,
if you consider it, that wasinvolved in this, because they've all
got crappy histories, they're all liars, they're all horrible people by most accounts.

(29:32):
So I think it's it's you've gota question whether he feels right now
is the right moment to be honestand seemingly for most of it. He
was credible. I mean he admittedto a couple of things that I mean,
he had admitted to at least onething that could get through him thrown
in jail. So I have tofind him at least somewhat credible. We'll
be back with the rest of ourjury deliberations right after this. So that

(30:00):
was the end of the prosecution's case, and then the defense only called one
witness. His name was Robert Costello. He was Cohen's attorney for some brief
time in twenty eighteen when Cohen gotinto legal trouble, and mister Costello testified
that he had been hired by DonaldTrump and Rudy Giuliani to defend Michael Cohen
and they were paying his bills intwenty eighteen. So, well, is

(30:23):
he credible? He's the one Ididn't find credible. He's yelling, you
know, he's defensive me too.Yeah. So, now that we've gone
through the testimony that we heard again, I want to throw it open to
everyone. I want to hear fromeveryone what you're thinking about this case and
if you have any questions for therest of us, Tony. Yeah.

(30:45):
Before I even get to that,everything I've read says that the Trump the
Trump defense people could ask a judgeto allow the jury to consider misdemeanor instead
of felonies. Yes, I wouldask a defense if they're going to do
that, and ask a judge ifhe's going to allow us to do that,
because that would make a big differenceto me. It is true from

(31:08):
what I have read, that thejury can be charged, that they can
come back with a guilty verdict ona misdemeanor but not the felony. That
is one of the options. Iwould imagine that the defense will ask the
judge or you know, we'll putthat into their closing arguments and we'll ask
the judge for that, because whywouldn't they, right think I disagree,

(31:33):
but it's a strategy thing, becauseagain I don't want to give away my
vote. But there's no way Icould find him not guilty of the misdemeanors
because in my mind, he didit. So WI is whether or not
he did it for evil reason andmake it a felony or not for evil
reasons, make it misdemeanor. Soif a defense wants him to get off
Scott free, it's a gamble.They don't don't give the jury the option

(31:57):
to do the misdemeanor. At theend of this, we'll have two votes.
The first one is guilty or notguilty on the misdemeanor charge, and
then we'll move on to guilty ornot guilty on the felony charge. Is
that okay with everybody? Can youexplain all the differences between the felony and

(32:17):
the misdemeanor, Yes, very briefly, and I'll explain it again at the
end. The misdemeanor is that theydid indeed break the Falsification of Business Records
Act. The felony is if itwas to further his campaign, that would
become an illegal campaign contribution, whichis a felony. Right. So,

(32:38):
now let's talk about the totality ofthe case. Now that we've gone through
the testimony, and we can continueto bring up specific points if you want
to. I'd like to get asense of the totality of the case,
what everybody is thinking. Lou,I'll start with you. As I've said
before, critibility is the key tome. Did I find each piece of

(32:58):
evidence presented by each witness credible?So far I can see I make a
decision that Trump and Stormy Daniels hada relationship and embarrass mister Trump in one
way or another. Then I cansee where the Pecker people contacted her and

(33:19):
tried to suppress the story with catchand kill. Then I can see where
the payment arrangement was made between Cohenand Trump. Lastly, he signed the
checks in the Oval office. SoI see the case and it's credible to
me. The question between felony andmisdemeanor is simple, probably both. In

(33:45):
New York State, you may notfalsify business records to make an illegal campaign
contribution, and falsifying business records inand of itself is a first degree class
E felony. So classification question justhow is it a campaign contribution? And

(34:07):
I kind of know the answer,but I want to just kind of explain
to me, like I'm five,my understanding and people, you know,
if you have a different understanding,please speak up. My understanding is that
they paid this money to Stormy Danielsto protect his presidential campaign, and that

(34:27):
becomes, in that sense a campaigncontribution to the campaign. And if it
wasn't on the books as a campaigncontribution, even if they would have paid
it anyways, I mean, ifDonald Trump had just written a check straight
to the Stormy Daniels. I don'tthink this matter would be in court.
But that's not what they did.They wrote checks on his business account,

(34:51):
and they falsified those records. Andin New York State, whether we like
it or not, the law isthat that is a class e and we
are not here to determine whether that'sa good law or a bad law.
We are here to determine whether thatlaw was violated. The other thing I
think that was an illegal campaign contributionwas that the total amount was over the

(35:15):
amount an individual can contribute to acampaign. So if it was a campaign
contribution, it would have been illegalanyways because it would have theoretically been one
campaign contribution from Michael Cohen Tony.Did you have a question, Yeah,
your statement about it being a felony, it's a felony if it was in
purviance of the campaign contribution, right, I mean, falsifyding a business record

(35:37):
is not a felony by itself.I think this is a legal question for
the judge, So let's throw thatquestion to the judge and get some clarification.
I would say to look at theindictment, which states, as I
remember it that false find business recordsis either a misdemeanor or a felony based

(35:57):
on why it's being done. Ifit's done cover up another crime, like
a campaign finance violation, it's afelony. If it's done for something more
inocuous, then it would be amisdemeanor. Quick response to that, except
and I agree with what you said. But the New York again, the
New York Times seems to have founda few dozen falsifying business record cases that

(36:22):
were charged as felonies under Bag andVance. And could I think we can
only find hold on, hold on, I'm gonna stop and step it here.
We are not lawyers. We arenot here to evaluate whether the State
of New York should have brought thiscase, whether they've done the same to
other people. Experts on TV cantalk about that all day long. The

(36:42):
State of New York did bring thiscase. It's not up to us to
decide whether that was a good decisionor a bad decision, a fair decision
or an unfair decision, whether DonaldTrump is being is this is a witch
hunter or not. Our job,if we were real jurors, our job
is simply to decide whether the factin this case, merit a guilty or
a not guilty verdict? Does anybodydisagree with me on that? Yeah,

(37:07):
I kind of do, go ahead, Tony slightly, which I agree.
I'm not I'm not arguing the stupidityof bringing the case or the non stupidity.
I'm arguing that there's precedent that theyalways charge or ninety nine percent of
the time, charge the other crimealong with this. So this leaves a
jury in a really, really uncomfortableposition because we have to decide on another

(37:30):
crime that wasn't argued in front ofus. Well, of course we haven't
heard the closing arguments. I thinkwe can assume that the state is going
to argue that it was. Infurther, it'so a campaign violation. So
why do we assume that for thesake of this discussion, because it would
seem counterintuitive for them not to right, But they didn't argue. But I

(37:52):
mean evidence was sufficient evidence I don'tthink was presented on that point. That's
fair. Maybe I'm wrong. Okay, that's fair. That's a good point.
But Tawny, we can't as jurorsgo and do a Google search and
see what other cases are that wouldbe improper. That would be bringing into
evidence into the deliberation that we don'thave right comment. Ignore my comment about

(38:13):
the New York Times. I'm justsitting there saying, how can I decide
this other crime that hasn't been argued, especially in front of me. Well,
it argued. They asked Hope Hicks, did she believe that all of
this concern about the stormy Daniel's thingwas about the election campaign? And she
said, yes, now we can. We can evaluate that and we can

(38:35):
believe it or disbelieve it. Now, let's clarify one other thing. As
I understand it, the question iswhether Donald Trump, in part or in
full made these decisions based on hiscampaign and in further of his campaign.
Now, there was some testimony ofwell, was he more worried about Milania?

(38:57):
Was he more worried about the campaign? As I understand it is,
it's not an either or if hewas in any part concerned about the campaign,
that is the violation doesn't matter whetherhe's also worried about Melannia being angry
with him, both can be trueat the same time. Well, there
was also that testimony too that Trumptried to stall that payment because he said

(39:21):
if he passed the election because hesaid, if you know he won,
then he won, and if hedidn't, when he didn't care. So
that sort of goes against the ideathat he was that concerned about Milania,
because why would he not care ifit came out after the election? You
know, correcked on the issue ofwhether or not it went to campaign.

(39:44):
David Pecker said that he was goingto be the eyes and the ears for
the campaign. Hope Hicks testified thatit had something to do with the campaign.
Michael Cohen testified that it had somethingto do with the campaign. So
it's not that they never talked aboutthe campaign. And I guess we as
jurors have to decide do we thinkPecker was lying about it being about the

(40:05):
campaign. Do we think Hope xwas lying about it being about the campaign?
Do we think Cohen was lying?Do we think everybody that the defense
put on or the prosecution put ondo we think that they were lying about
it being because of the campaign.To me, that's how I look at
it. I thought there was alot of testimony about it being with the
campaign. It's just why it wasso incredible. Okay, We've been going

(40:28):
for a while so let's see ifwe're close to any kind of decisions or
verdicts here. Is there anyone whodoesn't believe that there was a falsification of
business records? That's my first question. Is there anyone who doesn't believe that?
So? Can I actually raise onething on that I thought these were
legally found to be falsified because MichaelCohen already went to jail for falsifying them.

(40:52):
Well, we don't have that theseWe don't have that in front of
us. To my knowledge, thathas not been entered into evidence that he
went to jail for that crime.Therefore it's proof of something. And if
anybody knows differently, please tell me. But that I'm just trying to answer
that question. Cowen did not testifyto the fact about I went to jail,

(41:13):
and I don't remember that it wasnecessarily about these records. I think
there was more. He was convictedof this charge, but I don't recall
that there was ever any testimony elicitedfrom him where he said, Hey,
that's what I went to jail for. Therefore you know he he's guilty too.

(41:35):
If I was guilty. I don'trecall that exchange ever coming up me
either. No. Okay, butlet me once again ask, is there
anyone here who has problems believing thatthis scheme happened, that for whatever reason,
there was an agreement of some sortto payoff Stormy Daniels? And does

(41:57):
anybody believe that Donald Trump did notknow about this? Does anybody believe that
he was totally out of the loop? Okay, I'm going to assume that
that means that nobody believes that.Does anyone believe that there was a falsification
of records in the payments to MichaelCohen? Yes, let everybody show of

(42:19):
hands if you believe that there wasa falsification of records. I need to
see twelve hands or ten hands?I should say, there's only ten jurors
one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
nine, ten to help us out. And he held up two hands.
I'm two jurors. Tony did too, So that gets here to twelve.

(42:39):
So how many? So I'm goingto start with the misdemeanor charge.
How many people are willing to voteguilty on the misdemeanor charge that Donald Trump
did by signing those checks and labelingthem as legal expenses or retain Did you

(43:00):
have a question too. I havea question. I'm going to ignore it
because I think the judge asked meto ignore it. But I'm very uncomfortable
with the thirty four charges. That'slike charging me thirty four times for stealing
a big pack of gum. ButI'm just going to go along with it.
Okay, falsified check? Is itcharge? Yeah, for one crime,
But I'm not going to argue whichis I'm coomfortable with it. I

(43:22):
could be wrong, but I believethat the jury could find him guilty on
one charge and not guilty on theothers, even though they were all the
same. The jury, I think, can do pretty much whatever they want
in the jury room, including findingguilty on one charge and not guilty on
the other thirty three. But that'sprobably a question for the judge, So
let's throw to him and get aruling on that. His honor says that

(43:45):
the jury form is correct. Okay. So I believe that there were twelve
checks, eleven to twelve checks,and we're first going to vote on the
mist mean charges. Is everybody comfortablevoting guilty on all of the charges on

(44:06):
misdemeanor offenses committed by the defendant.I think, so, Mac, did
you vote yes? I'm I'm questioningbecause I know there's if we're thinking completely
beyond reasonable doubt, here, there'seleven Trump. There's eleven checks Trump signed.

(44:30):
There's another twenty something that he didn'tsign, or there's another batch that
he didn't sign. And I thinkthose eleven like unquestionably he signed them,
he wrote the memo, he didit. Yeah, let's assume that we're
voting on that the charges were onthe checks that he signed. So I
think we've just reached a unanimous guiltyverdict on the misdemeanor charge. If anybody

(44:54):
disagrees, please let me know.So now I think the question becomes,
and again I'm opening this to discussion. I don't want to be the judge
of jury on this. I thinkthe question becomes, did it rise to
the level of a felony because itwasn't. Further, it was falsified records.

(45:15):
In further, it's of another crime, specifically a campaign law violation,
and done or caused by Trump.Right, Okay, So let's throw that
open and have people discuss it.For a guy like Donald Trump who wouldn't
pay contractors who offered twenty cents onthe dollar to people who did legitimate work

(45:37):
for him, who was famous fornot paying his bills. It's hard to
believe that he would agree to fourhundred and twenty thousand dollars going out and
didn't know anything about it. Iagree with Paul, but I'll just say
that that, sorry to interrupt.We didn't learn that stuff in the trial?
Did we? What stuff? Whydid we learn that that Trump is

(46:00):
an asshole? I think we're allowed. I think we're allowed to act on
our life experiences, and that ispart of each individual's life experience to come
to that conclusion or not. Ican't trust any of them, Honestly,
I don't trustfully all of them.But I know that this is the truth

(46:21):
because this is what somebody would do. And of course it's a felony,
because he wouldn't have even done anythingor approved in it as crap unless it
was going to better his campaign.Okay, you had point hummation. I
find that the evidence presented is credible. I don't care about the personalities involved.

(46:45):
I'm looking at the law. Don'tjudge, just lead, ye be
judged. Here's how I judge.I find the chain of evidence from the
conspiracy to the cashing of the check, to the reporting of the checks to
be both misdemeanors. It is notautomatically a felony to do it, but

(47:07):
in the furtherance of a misdemeanor,it becomes a felony in because they made
their case the preponderance well passed reasonabledoubt to me, says this happened,
so I would find him guilty onfelony as well as misdemeanor, and asked

(47:28):
the judge, should we judge theother counts? Okay, Well, before
we do that, I want tokeep this to jury deliberations for a moment.
Although that's a good question. Iwant to make sure that everybody gets
a chance to speak, So I'mgoing to go Sally, did you have
anything you'd like to add? Yes, I believe that the prosecution made their

(47:49):
case. I think they laid itout pretty perfectly, and that even incredible
people were shown to be credible becausethey had the evidence to back it up.
They corroborated each other without particularly knowingit. They were just testifying,
and I found them credible because theyhad photocopies or pictures of the chechs.

(48:14):
They even had a recording of Trumpchiming in on payment, saying, so
we pay it right now, andthey said no, no, no,
no no. In a conversation withCohen, okay, I want to go
to Erica and then to mac Well, I personally thought they definitely showed he
falsified documents. And I think thefact that they had the whole catch and

(48:38):
kill scheme going on with David Peckershows that they were definitely trying to influence
the election, and the Stormy Danielswas just an extension of that. So
I would say they proved the felonythat it was in furtherance of the campaign.
I think they did show it.You know, I don't believe that

(49:00):
he would have done all that justfor millennia when he said it didn't really
matter if he after the election,you know, I think it was all
about the election. Okay, thankyou mac. To me, the biggest
question is the alternative is Michael Cohendid this not out of the goodness of
his heart or he thought that doingit he was going to get credit and

(49:20):
he was going to get a placein the White House wherever you've got to.
There's a lot of logically you've gotto take as to why the hell
my Michael Cohen did this if itwasn't because of Donald Trump, and given
the timing, given everything, Imean, there's I don't see how you
can't think it was at least partiallyabout the election. Okay, Kelly,
there's enough evidence for me. That'sall I got. And the recordings kind

(49:44):
of did it for me as well. That's enough for me, Okay,
Okay, me me. Thanks.I agree with the previous speakers who had
said that the prosecution laid out avery good case, and I agree with
that Trump was fully in the miand Julie I already stated. I mean,
I found Pecker to be very credible. He said that he was the

(50:05):
eyes in the ears of the campaign. I don't believe that Cohen would have
taken out a second on his houseif you didn't expect to be paid back.
Hope Piggs testimony, it showed thatthere was something that was going on.
And then when you listen to thetape of Trump talking, he clearly
knew what was going on. Imean, I agree with what Max said,

(50:29):
like the alternative doesn't make any sense, and the defense just didn't really
present an alternative that would give medoubt and to me, that's the big
thing is I don't really have anydoubt. There was nothing presented that gave
me doubt. And then finally,I want to go to Tony. Tony,
do you have any thoughts on thefelony charge. I guess I'm a

(50:50):
minority of one, but I can'tget there. I mean, it would
have been trivial if it was ifhe did commit these crimes, it would
have been trivial for a post sectionto charge him with either tax evasion which
would be an obvious consequence of mischaracterizingco payment, or with influencing an election.
They didn't charge him, so Ican't get beyond a reasonable doubt that

(51:13):
those crimes existed. Okay, Soit seems like, and I'm taking myself
out of it, of the tenjurors who were here, it sounds like
nine are ready at this point tovote to convict on the felony and one
is not ready. I'm going toallow you guys to talk with Tony and
see if you could work through this. So, Tony, I have a

(51:34):
question for you. So you thinkthat you think that he committed fraud by
paying Cohan, and you already saidthat right of the misdemeanors. Why do
you think that he committed the fraud? Oh, I think he did what
you said he did. I thinkhe probably did that, but that hasn't
been proven to me. That's justif you'll pin me down. It's like,
oh, yeah, he probably diddo that, but that's not beyond

(51:57):
a reasonable doubt. Right, Somy question is what would prove that to
you? What would they need topresent besides the tape recording and that Pecker
said that he was doing catch andkill for the campaign and Hope Hicks said
it was for the campaign. Whatelse would it take for you to get
to the point. I don't Idon't think I can, because they should
have charged one of the two underlyingcrimes you talk about as a federal crime.

(52:21):
So this is wait though that there'sa federal election interference, but there's
also a state election interference. Theycould have charged them with state election interference,
or even much more simply, theycould have just charged them with state
tax evasion. He mischaracterized what you'resaying is true. He mischaracterized a non
business expense as a deductible business expense. That would have been a slam dunk,

(52:45):
but he didn't commit the fraud toevade taxes. And that's what the
law. What he's been charged with, is that he committed the fraud in
furtherance to cover up a crime hedidn't commit the fraud tax evasion. Yes,
all right, but wait, sowait what I mean I would ask
is like a semantic issue, Judgeor Kevin, But I see call that

(53:07):
in the charging documents they said theylisted three possible crimes federal election interference,
state election interference, and state taxevasion. Those three things they said he
could he was committing a fraud andfurther and so okay, so this is
an honest this is an honest questionof interpretation. And DJ is a very

(53:30):
knowledgeable person. I'm going to throwto him, and as the judge,
I'm going to and I think weshould all honor how he decides we should
come to a decision on this.On this point, I have put the
charging documents in the chat in caseanybody wants to reference those. To summarize,
there are thirty four counts of falsifyingbusiness records in the first degree,

(53:52):
and that each each count is aseparate record. And it's not just the
checks. It's a number of differenttypes of business records from count one the
defendant in the County of New Yorkand elsewhere on or about February fourteenth,
twenty seventeen, with the intent todefraud and intent to commit another crime and
aid and conceal the Commission thereof madea false entry in the business records of

(54:15):
an enterprise to wit an invoice fromMichael Cohen dated February fourteenth and marked as
a record. And it goes onto detail each of the thirty four records,
and it indicates that all of thosewere cover ups of other crimes not
included in this indictment. But doesit say what the felony charges in the

(54:39):
charging document? According to a pressrelease from the DA's office at the time
of announcing the charges after the grandjury indictment, it explained that falsifying business
records, just because you're a dopewho falsified business records as a misdemeanor and

(54:59):
you pay a fine if you doit with the intent to cover up other
activities that are illegal, that raisesit to a felony. And let me
find that document again, can Isay, really quickly in the charging document,
I glanced at the first page andthey're using the the felony charge.

(55:22):
They're not using the misdemeanor charge.They haven't. They never charged the misdemeanor,
They've only charged right. The questionas to whether the judge will instruct
them on the mystery, And whatI can say right now is that the
the indictment and the statement of factsare available to you. That I have

(55:44):
a question for the judge if webelieve that he did it in an attempt
to cover up an alleged crime thathas not been shown to have occurred.
That yeah, Whether whether or notthere is a charge for a commission of
a crime, and whether or nota crime has been committed are not the

(56:08):
same thing. You, as ajuror, have the right if you wish
to decide that the prosecution's refusal topresent a charge would be enough for reasonable
doubt. That's your decision, that'snot mine. I am the judge,
But I am telling you it doesnot have to be that way. Well,

(56:31):
I have a question to judge.I can't tell you when I can't
tell you, I cannot tell youthe lack of a charge means that it
didn't happen. I can't say that. I can't tell you the lack of
a charge gives you enough reasonable doubt. I can't say the lack of a
charge can't give you enough reasonable doubt. I can't give those absolutes. And

(56:52):
to ask a question of the judge, Yes, but I want to also
have everybody be a part of this. I think we know that he has
been charged with a felony. Ithink that's in the charging documents. There's
some confusion here as to what thatfelony is. Some people think it's in
furtherance of a crime. Some peoplethink it has to do with in furtherance

(57:16):
of an election donations of campaign financeviolation. But with all respect to my
fellow juror, to say he hasn'tbeen charged, I think is not correct.
He is going to be charged.The judge is going to send them
to the jury box to decide afelony count. We as the mock jury,

(57:40):
have so far voted to convict himon a misdemeanor charge, and we
found that there was falsification of records. The question now for this group is
simply, did Donald Trump knowingly dothat in furtherance of another crime? Has

(58:00):
been charged. It isn't just furtheranceof a crime. It's concealment of a
crime. Just to clarify, Okay, that's what the charging. The charges
say is intent to defraud and intentto commit another crime. I mean,
to me, the intent is there. It's been verified by multiple sources.

(58:20):
And I'm going to direct everybody tospeak to Tony because he seems to be
the one who's having trouble making.I was trying to talk to was talking
because the issue is is if youthink that he committed a crime, why
do you think he committed that.I just want to add, so you
said, Tony that the charge hewasn't charged, but he couldn't have been
charged at the time they charged MichaelCohen because he was president and he was

(58:45):
an unindicted co conspiracy spiritor in theMichael Cohen case. In charge now maybe,
but we're not really here to decidethat. I mean, that's they're
up to their judgment. Maybe we'replaying lawyer. I agree with Erica's point.
I think we're playing lawyer here andnot jurorsst has decided the charges in

(59:06):
front of us, not what theydidn't charge, but the question I asked
the charge, which he Yet heanswered a slightly different question if we have
reasonable doubt that the other crime occurred, but we agree that Trump was trying
to conceal that alleged other crime.Is that good enough? What other crime

(59:29):
are you referred to when you saywe don't extra interperence? That's what this
was all about. So so youhave doubts that there was that there was
an attempt to cover up the StormyDaniels payment to further his campaign. Is
that what you're saying. I'm notthere beyond a reasonable doubt. I wouldn't
say that Trump did it to coverthat up, but I'm just not beyond

(59:52):
a doubt money. That's why Ikeep saying concealed. If you go read
with the losses, the reason whythe law says they can bump it up
is whether or not. And that'swhy I keep focusing on conceal. And
that's why I get to the pointwhere I think that I can convict him
for a felony is because I don'tknow any other reason why he would have

(01:00:15):
committed that. So if I guessfor me as a juror if I can't
find the reason why he committed thefraud, then maybe it's not fraud at
all. Maybe it really I getyou know what I I that's yeah,
I'm splitting hairs a little too.Then hereah, well, whatever the metaphor
is. Without buttraying it, I'dconvict him. I mean, we want

(01:00:37):
you to come to a decision thatyou're comfortable with. We don't want to
know. I am, I am, it's it's it's still not for thirty
four convictions. So I think that'sridiculous. But okay, Uh, Tony,
do what your heart tells you.The idea of the train of thought,
previous actions, motive all lead tothe same place and then back to

(01:01:02):
connect them with the payoff man.You you vote your heart. No,
you can't vote. You vote thelaw. Most of it seems to have
been well passed reasonable doubt. Thanksyou remember, reasonable doubt doesn't mean absolute.

(01:01:22):
Nothing else in the world could havehappened. It's a reasonable doubt that
something occurred. And the question isis there reasonable doubt or not? And
Tony, you only only you candetermine for yourself whether you can come overcome
that hurdle. But I've overcome itthe other way. I believe that Trump

(01:01:43):
intended to cover up a crime.So that's enough for me to vote guilty.
Okay. So on the first count, how many votes do we have
for guilty? We had ten?We have ten. Everybody said okay.
Then I'm going to ask do wehave a unanimous jury decision on that?
On all counts? All hands havegone up. Okay, it looks like

(01:02:07):
Judge, I think we can reportto you that this jury has found the
defendant, Donald Trump to be guiltyof thirty four felon accounts or however many
felon accounts he was charged with,and we recommend hanging. I didn't quite
go back. I have a requestof the judge. And first I'd like

(01:02:30):
to say, my name's Lou Deck, the comic in Red Shoes for forty
five years. Who my reputation andresume if you could find me in contemporar
court right now? You mean old. So let just want to say,
louis the first jury to go public. He's selling a story on the mass

(01:02:52):
market just to further his comedy career. You have broken the Jerry secretcy order
and that's enough to find you incontempt, sir, Thank you, thank
you. That's a hell of aresume. Point a fake judge on a
fake jury, durgo zoom call foundme in faked contempt. I think we've

(01:03:12):
got a new game show here.Senating will take place two weeks from now.
Court is adjourned. You were allterrific. I thank you so much
for your time. Thank you guysso much. You guys were great,
very nice meeting everybody. Thank youall for participating. This was really fun.

(01:03:34):
Thank you. You actually changed myopinion in real life that something's jury.
I just want to add this.You know, I generally know with
a couple of the exceptions to oneare two people who who are who are
listeners and volunteered for this. Everybodyelse I know through Facebook or in the

(01:03:55):
real world. And you know,I knew that there was going to be
a artisan bias on this jury.But I also knew that there was one
person who he and I have beenin many threads where he has made his
political views known, and they arethey are not necessarily Biden friendly, and

(01:04:16):
I think that it's it's first ofall, it says a lot about Tony
that he was allowed us all tospeak our minds and he shared his thoughts
and it was all done very civillyand to the extent that he feels that
his thinking has come around. Ithink that might be the ultimate takeaway from
this exercise, right, Sell reallywell, yeah, I mean it was

(01:04:40):
longer than anticipated, but I don'tthink there was any way to make it
shorter, if that makes sense.What I thought was really interesting is that
what it came down to was nota question of the actions of the defendant,
but how the law applies to thoseactions. Like nobody was uncertain that
the events happened as described. Itwas did the pegs fit into the holes,

(01:05:05):
so to speak? So I thoughtthat was telling. They kept bringing
up questions of like is this atrustworthy person? Is this? And I
think everyone does this, like theywanted to believe the people they liked,
or they wanted to believe the partsthat they believed that they wanted to like.

(01:05:25):
So like with Michael Cohen, forexample, and I know we all
do this, and even I dothis. No one trusted him. They
said, we don't trust this witness, but we do think he did he
did tell the truth here, butwe don't trust him. We don't like
him. He's not a good person. But this is all true what he
did the other guy, robertell Theywere like, now he's he was just

(01:05:51):
flat out lying, and we don'tlike him. No, everything, There
really is a lot about personality.There really is a farase and just your
own personal biases that come in.Not that our jury wasn't awesome, they
were the best jury that we couldbuy. Well, what don't say that.
One thing about Postello in particular ishe was one of the few witnesses

(01:06:14):
about whom nobody had any preconceived notions. He was not a household name the
way some of these other people were. So for people to be having that
visceral reaction to this guy that,like, I don't think he was trustworthy
in the slightest, but they didn'tknow anything else about him, Like,
for all we know, he's aboy scout who walks the little old ladies
across the street. But his appearancein this trial was so off putting that

(01:06:36):
no one believed that he was crediblebecause of that isolated moment. He was
approved to be lying by his ownemails, and I, frank, I
would humbly submit that mafia lawyers andeagle scouts. That's even diagram with two
circles, I hope. So.Actually, so my takeaway is for our

(01:07:02):
listeners, we put out a lotof invitations to this, and frankly,
knowing that my sample size of Facebookfriends tends to lean towards the democratic side
of the spectrum, I made avery concerted effort to invite as many Republicans
and conservatives that I know, andunfortunately, for scheduling reasons or other reasons,

(01:07:27):
we didn't get as many as themas we would have liked. And
I would have really been interested tosee how a jury that had maybe one
or two more people of that politicalbent might have come to a conclusion,
whether the same or different. ButI think it's very telling that one person
who I know to be a veryvery conservative person, and I've had many

(01:07:50):
very intelligent conversations with him where wesimply see the world of politics completely differently.
I think it's telling that that personwas able to be, for lack
of a better word, to beconvinced, I was gonna say swayed,
but I'll say convinced by peers whomaybe didn't share his policies or his political
thoughts. That this person was ableto be convinced to change his initial assessment

(01:08:16):
on one of the one of thecharges, and it says something about this
group and frankly, and I'm goingto I'm going to get all misty eyed
in corny, But it says somethingabout the American people in general that we
can find these ten people who willpark their disagreements at the door and try

(01:08:36):
to figure out what is the correctthing to do based on the facts and
based on the law, when atleast one or two of the nine people
in robes at the Supreme Court ofthe United States don't do that kind of
thing exactly, and they bend thelaw on their facts to fit the preconceived
notions. We didn't see that hereamong these ten people. Yeah. And

(01:09:00):
just one other thing that I thinkis illuminating from this exercise that I want
to share with our listeners is that, you know, there's been a lot
I've watched probably as much of thecoverage as most human beings are capable of
watching. And I've heard countless expertsdismiss Michael Cohen. How can you believe
him? He's a lot. Imean, I've even heard like people that

(01:09:20):
most of us would consider very downthe middle, like Anderson Cooper saying,
oh, he's got to be lyingabout this, or he's got to be
lying about that, or I couldn'ttrust this guy to take care of my
kids. You hear countless comments aboutthat from lawyers who are considered expert enough
to be on television, But whena jury is charged with assessing evidence and

(01:09:45):
testimony, they may see it differently. Which is listen, none of us
have a crystal ball as to what'sgoing to happen at the end of his
case. But if the jury convictson one or more counts, it will
be because they did not dismiss MichaelCohen out of hand the way so many
legal experts did. And I thinkit's very sad that the television networks put

(01:10:09):
so many people on the air whowere so unprofessional in their assessments. That's
well, I think that. Ithink the thing to remember, though,
is whether lawyers are democratic, Republican, liberal, conservative, fascist, non
fascist, Russian assets, real Americans, or you want to describe them.
They were either prosecuting attorneys or defenseattorneys if they have criminal law experience,

(01:10:33):
and if they don't, they're notgoing to be They're not going to be
put into these panels anyway. Andfrankly, if someone has been a defense
lawyer for ten to fifteen to twentyyears, their first instinct is going to
be the prosecution's witness is not credible. And I can show how the prosecute
witness is not credible by abcdftp',whatever the heck it is. They're not
going to concern themselves with the politicsof it. They're going to say Michael

(01:10:55):
co is not credible because it isthe prosecution witness, and prosecuting witnesses are
not credible because those people are abunch of lying bastards. That's how events
ernies think, and frankly, they'reproven right far more often than I'm comfortable
with. So I don't think it'sa matter of them trying to be moderate
or any of the other things.I think it's there. If they're defense
attorneys, they're for instinct, isprosecution witness not credible, and they go

(01:11:18):
with that. I think it's moreprofessional than political in this case. Yeah,
And I also think it's a there'sa little bit of overthinking that goes
on when you're actually an expert onsomething and you can't you can't compartmentalize down
to just this case, especially ifyou've been observing all these people for eight
ten years like we all have.Yeah, and certainly the platform has a

(01:11:44):
lot to do with it. Obviously, Fox was probably picking experts that would
espouse a point of view that theyfelt that their audience wanted to hear,
and one could argue that the othertwo networks, maybe we're doing the same
on the other side. I'm notgoing to get into who was being more
political than others, but clearly thoseexperts came in with agendas, not just

(01:12:05):
a blank slate. In my opinion, Well, the only crime that we
can be guilty of is boring ouraudience. And we have run longer than
we've ever run before. So let'swrap this up. We want to thank
our guests. I want to thankeach of you for participating. I know
it was hard to sometimes sit backand listen. And I want to thank

(01:12:27):
Alan Kenney for the music that we'reabout to hear. Let's give grace to
Alan with that. Guys, we'regoing to be hearing a verdict this week
very quickly. What do you thinkthe verdict's going to be very quickly?

(01:12:48):
Oh, not guilty. It couldgo either way. I just don't know
that you hear that. You hearthat in your voice. That's uncertainty.
And because of that, not Guilty. Building In New York, mob lawyers
lose, and Castello was the moblawyer here. And for what it's worth,
I anticipated some kind of a hungjury, because I doubt there four

(01:13:12):
person is going to be half asgood as I was.