(New York) The judge presiding in New York over Donald Trump’s civil trial for financial fraud in the management of his real estate empire on Friday threatened the former president with “heavy sanctions”, up to prison, for having let on his campaign website an insulting publication for his clerk.
During the hearing, where Donald Trump was absent, magistrate Arthur Engoron recalled that he had already prohibited, from the second day of the trial on October 3, all parties from attacking his team, after a publication deemed “degrading” for its clerk on the account of the Republican billionaire on his Truth Social network.
PHOTO JEENAH MOON, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Judge Arthur Engoron
The post had been removed, but “despite this clear order, I learned last night that the offending message had never been removed from the DonaldJTrump.com site and that it remained on this site for the last 17 days,” before being “withdrew late yesterday evening (Thursday), but only in response to an email from this court”, added the judge, according to statements relayed by the American media and confirmed to AFP by a spokesperson for the court.
In today’s climate, inflammatory untruths can, and have in some cases, resulted in serious physical harm or worse.
Arthur Engoron
He then called on the former president’s lawyers to “explain why this blatant violation” of his order “should not result in serious sanctions, including financial penalties, indictment of Donald Trump for contempt to magistrate and, possibly, his incarceration”.
According to several local media, one of Donald Trump’s lawyers, Chris Kise, made amends, pleading an accident and recalling that the publication had indeed been removed on Truth Social.
“It’s unfortunate and I apologize on behalf of my client,” Chris Kise said, according to NBC News.
The magistrate indicated that he would rule on the incident.
Because of his often virulent statements, Donald Trump has also been barred from public comments aimed at prosecutors, court staff and witnesses at the upcoming criminal trial in Washington over his alleged attempts to overturn the results of the presidential election. 2020.
A measure taken by the judge to contain the risks of threats, intimidation and harassment of the people targeted in the age of social networks.