President Donald Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was in touch as far back as 2015 with a Russian who offered 'political synergy' with the Trump election campaign, the federal special counsel said Friday in a court filing.
Filings by prosecutors from both New York and the Trump-Russia special counsel's office laid out for the first time details of the cooperation of Cohen, a vital witness who once said he'd 'take a bullet' for the president but who in recent months has become a prime antagonist and pledged to come clean with the government.
Federal prosecutors said Friday that Cohen deserves a substantial prison sentence despite his cooperation with investigators. He is to be sentenced next week, and may face several years in prison.
Real meeting: This was the scene when Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump sat down for the first time at the G20 in Hamburg in July 2017. But Michael Cohen wanted to get them together two years before that - and lied to Congress when he said Trump knew noting in advance about the failed attempt
In his sites: Robert Mueller offered no recommendation on how long Michael Cohen should spend in prison but federal prosecutors in New York did - saying he should be locked up for between four and five years
Trump tweeted barely an hour after prosecutors filed their court statement about Cohen that it 'totally clears' him
In hours of meetings with prosecutors, Cohen detailed his intimate involvement in an array of episodes, including some that directly touch the president, that are at the center of investigations into campaign finance violations and potential collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.
In one of the filings, Mueller details how around November 2015, some five months after Trump launched his bid for the presidency and well before previously reported contacts, Cohen spoke to a purported 'trusted person' in the Russian Federation who offered the campaign 'political synergy' and 'synergy on a government level.'
Cohen said the person 'repeatedly proposed' a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, claiming it could have a 'phenomenal' impact 'not only in political but in a business dimension as well'.
'Cohen, however, did not follow up on this invitation,' the filing added.
In an additional filing Friday evening, prosecutors said former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort lied to them about his contacts with a Russian associate and Trump administration officials.
Manafort, who has pleaded guilty to several counts, violated his plea agreement by then telling 'multiple discernible lies' to prosecutors, they said.
Cohen also discussed a Moscow real estate deal that could have netted Trump's business hundreds of millions of dollars and conversations with a Russian intermediary who proposed a meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin as well as offering synergy with the campaign, prosecutors said.
Cohen, dubbed Trump's 'legal fixer' in the past, also described his work in conjunction with Trump in orchestrating hush money payments to two women - a porn star and a Playboy model - who said they had sex with Trump a decade earlier. Prosecutors in New York, where Cohen pleaded guilty in August in connection with those payments, said the lawyer 'acted in coordination and at the direction' of Trump.
Despite such specific allegations of Trump's actions, the president quickly tweeted after news of the filings: 'Totally clears the President. Thank you!'
The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York wrote that Cohen worked at the direction of President Donald Trump in 2016 to arrange payments to two women for the purpose of keeping their sexual affair allegations from becoming public before the election
The Michael Cohen sentencing memorandum from a federal prosecutor in New York recomments 51 to 63 months in prison
Later, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in two statements that the Manafort filing 'says absolutely nothing about the President' and the Cohen filings 'tell us nothing of value that wasn't already known.'
Cohen also told prosecutors that he and Trump discussed a potential meeting with Putin on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in 2015, shortly after Trump announced his candidacy for president, the filings say.
In a footnote, special counsel Robert Mueller's team writes that Cohen conferred with Trump 'about contacting the Russia government before reaching out to gauge Russia's interest in such a meeting,' though it never took place.
In an additional filing Friday evening, prosecutors said former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort lied to them about his contacts with a Russian associate and Trump administration officials.
Manafort, who has pleaded guilty to several counts, violated his plea agreement by then telling 'multiple discernible lies' to prosecutors, they said.
Prosecutors in Cohen's case said that even though he cooperated in their investigation into the hush money payments to women he nonetheless deserved to spend time in prison.
'Cohen did provide information to law enforcement, including information that assisted the Special Counsel's Office,' they said. 'But Cohen's description of those efforts is overstated in some respects and incomplete in others.'
In meetings with Mueller's team, Cohen 'provided information about his own contacts with Russian interests during the campaign and discussions with others in the course of making those contacts,' the court documents said.
Cohen provided prosecutors with a 'detailed account' of his involvement, along with the involvement of others, in efforts during the 2016 presidential campaign to complete a deal to build a Trump Tower Moscow, the documents said. He also provided information about attempts by Russian nationals to reach Trump's campaign, they said.
However, in the crimes to which he pleaded guilty in August, he was motivated 'by personal greed and repeatedly used his power and influence for deceptive ends.'
Prosecutors said the court's Probation Department estimated that federal sentencing guidelines call for Cohen to serve at least four years in prison. They said that 'reflects Cohen's extensive, deliberate and serious criminal conduct.'
Prosecutors say Cohen 'already enjoyed a privileged life,' and that 'his desire for even greater wealth and influence precipitated an extensive course of criminal conduct.'
Link hienalouca.com
https://hienalouca.com/2018/12/08/trump-knew-in-advance-about-michael-cohens-bid-to-set-up-meeting-with-putin/
Main photo article President Donald Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was in touch as far back as 2015 with a Russian who offered ‘political synergy’ with the Trump election campaign, the federal special counsel said Friday in a court filing.
Filings by prosecutors from both New York and the...
It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.
Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves US News HienaLouca
https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2018/12/08/00/7157556-6470451-image-a-17_1544228191770.jpg
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