(Washington) A second of former US President Donald Trump’s co-defendants for his alleged unlawful attempts to overturn the result of the 2020 election in Georgia, conservative lawyer Sidney Powell, pleaded guilty Thursday in connection with an agreement with the prosecution.
Initially targeted by seven counts, Sidney Powell, 68, pleaded guilty to six offenses of conspiracy to interfere in the accomplishment of electoral tasks, during a hearing in Atlanta, capital of Georgia (south). -East).
She was sentenced to six years in prison, a $6,000 fine and $2,700 in compensation to Georgia. Sidney Powell also wrote a letter of apology to the state’s voters.
The 19 defendants named in the indictment delivered August 14 in Fulton County Court, under a Georgia law on organized crime, all initially pleaded not guilty.
Among them, Scott Hall was the first to plead guilty, on September 29, to five offenses of conspiracy to interfere in the performance of electoral duties.
Sidney Powell has also undertaken to testify at the future trials of the other defendants, the date of which has not been set, with the exception of that of another lawyer, Kenneth Chesebro, which will begin on October 23 with the selection of the jury.
According to the indictment, Sidney Powell, a former federal prosecutor, was primarily involved in breaking into an election center in Georgia to illegally copy computer data.
The act also mentions his participation in a meeting at the White House on December 18, 2020 in the presence of Mr. Trump and his former personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, also prosecuted in Georgia.
During this meeting on strategies aimed at influencing the result of the presidential election of November 3, 2020 won by Democrat Joe Biden, “including the seizure of electoral materials”, Mr.me Powell was tasked with “investigating allegations of fraudulent voting in Georgia and elsewhere,” according to the document.
Accusations of conspiracy
Unlike the sprawling procedure in Georgia, the case investigated at the federal level by special prosecutor Jack Smith, for allegedly illicit attempts to obtain the reversal of the results of the vote won by Joe Biden, targets only one defendant: Donald Trump.
But the special prosecutor’s indictment mentions “six conspirators”, who are not identified by name, but easily recognizable by the statement of the facts, including Sidney Powell, alias “conspirator number 3”, supporting theses qualified in deprived of “crazy” by Donald Trump, who nevertheless relayed his “disinformation”.
Accused of conspiracy for having notably incriminated electronic systems linked to Venezuela and Cuba, she had unsuccessfully brought proceedings against the governor of Georgia for “massive electoral fraud”.
Donald Trump, favorite in the Republican primaries, denounces his legal troubles as so much “electoral interference” at the instigation of the Biden administration to exclude him from the race for the White House in 2024.
His trial in federal court in Washington is scheduled to begin March 4 and is expected to last about four weeks, according to Jack Smith.
In Georgia, the prosecution expects a trial to last four months.