CNN legal analyst Elie Honig stated on Thursday during CNN’s coverage of the trial of former President Donald Trump’s business record that witness Michael Cohen had his “knees chopped out” during defense lawyer Todd Blanche’s cross-examination.
“I just wonder how we got to this point and what you think you’ve seen a lot of things develop in court. You’ve seen a lot of trials. Have you ever seen something like this kind of a twist like this?” CNN host Brianna Keilar asked.
Honig responded: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a star cooperating witness get his knees chopped out quite as clearly and dramatically as what just happened with Michael Cohen. I’ve certainly seen very effective cross-examinations of cooperating witnesses. I’ve seen aspects of their story cut into and called into question.”
“But this goes to the heart of the allegation here. That phone call on October 24th, and it looks to the jury and to Anderson Cooper and Kara Scannell, Judge George Grasso, who are all in the courthouse, that that was a devastating moment,” Honig added.
He went on to say: “We are at an interesting moment right now. We 25 minutes away from the end of the court day, which ends at 4 today? I believe that Todd Blanche is going to keep his cross going so that when they come back into court for five days and on Monday, if he finds new stuff in the next four days, he will have the ability to continue the cross.”
Famed attorney Alan Dershowitz believes that Trump’s attorney should make a key demand in his Manhattan case in which he is alleged to have paid hush money payments to adult movie star Stormy Daniels. The former Harvard law professor said that the former president’s attorneys should request a “missing witness instruction” in his business records trial regarding former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg.
“The reason the government does want to call him seems obvious, that if he testified, he would testify against Cohen, he would not corroborate, he would undercut Cohen and that’s not good reason,” he said on an episode of his podcast.
He said that the prosecutors are required to call a witness that they control if that witness can provide evidence that benefits the defendant.
“The person who could have corroborated Cohen’s testimony if it’s true, if it’s true, that’s the key, is Allen Weisselberg, he’s sitting in prison under the control of government. The government snaps his fingers and puts him on as a witness. He could be called as a witness. The government has chosen not to call him as witness, and this issue should be litigated very extensively by Trump’s lawyers,” the attorney said.
“So, it starts by Trump’s lawyers making a motion calling for missing witness instruction: ‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, if there was a witness under the control of one side and that side declined to call them and his testimony would have been relevant, you can presume that the testimony would have been unfavorable,’” he said.
