This is a historic first for a former US president. Donald Trump pleaded not guilty to falsification of accounting documents, this Tuesday April 4, in a New York court, during an unprecedented criminal hearing which has awakened passions in America and paved the way for a trial in less than a year. Left free without judicial control, the 76-year-old former president could have to face a trial in January 2024, even if he will try everything to avoid this ordeal before the presidential election, in which he is a candidate.
In the crowded courtroom of the court, Donald Trump showed himself with a closed face, a stern look. He spent about two hours in the Manhattan courthouse, where he had arrived surrounded by bodyguards, in a convoy under very high security flown over by helicopters from the American media.
In front of the courthouse, handfuls of activists for and against Trump, sometimes colorful, were separated from the first invectives – the authorities being concerned that this tense situation, already at the heart of exceptional media coverage, does not degenerate . His detractors had unfurled a huge banner “Trump lies all the time”.
34 counts
The Republican, the first U.S. president to suffer such a fate, faces 34 charges that relate to payments to cover up three embarrassing cases before the 2016 election, according to the indictment released Tuesday. His lawyer Todd Blanche denounced a “sad” indictment “ready made” and promised to fight it. The ex-tenant of the White House therefore pleaded not guilty. He, who claims his innocence, claims to be the victim of a “witch hunt” orchestrated by the Democrats of President Joe Biden, who would have “robbed” him of his victory in the 2020 presidential election.
Donald Trump nevertheless had to submit, in court, to the ritual imposed on any defendant: to state his name, age and profession, to take a fingerprint. On the other hand, he probably escaped the famous “mugshot” – the taking of a mugshot, the source of so much public humiliation for stars in the United States.
The charges relate in particular to accounting fraud during the legal payment in October 2016 and the subsequent reimbursement of $ 130,000 to the actress of pornographic films Stormy Daniels. Her real name Stephanie Clifford, this woman, who has been working with the justice system for five years, was supposed to conceal a supposed and very brief extramarital relationship in 2006 with Donald Trump, which he denies. The $130,000 she received from the former president’s former lawyer and handyman, Michael Cohen – who served time in prison and turned against his boss in 2018 – had not been paid. reported in the 2016 presidential candidate Trump’s campaign accounts.
A possible violation of New York State electoral laws: this sum had been recorded, potentially illegally, as “legal fees” in the accounts of his company Trump Organization, already condemned in December and January to a civil fine of 1 $.6 million for fraud.
But Donald Trump has also been indicted because he “orchestrated” a series of payments to cover up two other embarrassing cases before the 2016 presidential election: a doorman at Trump Tower, who claimed to have information about a hidden child, received 30,000 dollars to remain silent, while a woman who presented herself as a former mistress received 150,000 dollars to be discreet, detailed the prosecutor in a press release.
A criminal trial of former US President Donald Trump in an accounting malfeasance case could begin in January 2024, Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Juan Merchan said on Tuesday. Donald Trump’s lawyers present at this unprecedented hearing would prefer the spring of 2024. There is no doubt that this choice will weigh heavily in his attempt to win the presidential election again, scheduled for November that same year.