The Future for Cohen and Manafort

I need to get my peepers checked and a new prescription because the eye strain headache I have right now is on almost a migraine level. So, this post will be shorter than it would otherwise be. There is someone who was just convicted of 23 felonies, including charges of mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering and violations of federal election law. He also misused charities and fraudulently misled donors. He used the money to finance personal purchases and well as to pay for political dirty tricks. He’s going to jail pending sentencing because he’s a flight risk.

Somewhat shockingly, this person is neither Michael Cohen nor Donald Trump. Yes, one or both of them are guilty of all all of the same felonies. But, no, this person is a former congressman from Texas named Steve Stockman.

Stockman will appeal the verdict, but he’s up shit creek.

A jury in federal court in Houston ruled Thursday afternoon that Stockman is guilty of all but one of the 24 felonies he was charged with last March. After about 16 hours of deliberations over three days, the 12-person panel only declined to convict on one of four counts of wire fraud…

…That verdict puts Stockman — a firebrand conservative who served two nonconsecutive terms in the U.S. House before losing a 2014 challenge to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas — at risk of decades in federal prison.

I am somewhat surprised at the amount of jail time people like Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen are facing considering that their crimes are white collar, but when you get nailed on more than a dozen counts the jail time quickly adds up to an effective life sentence for a man already past the age of 50.

I doubt Stockman knows anything about Trump that Bob Mueller is interested in, but Manafort and Cohen still have a get out of jail free card if they want to use it. They might not escape jail entirely, but they can avoid effective life sentences. Or they can wait around for Trump to obstruct justice again by pardoning them. But then they’ll lose their right to invoke the Fifth Amendment and they’ll have to talk.

14 Comments

Parallax on April 12, 2018 at 4:44 pm

Cohen’s fucked either way because the State of New York will prosecute if he’s pardoned at the federal level. Guy is toast so I’d be surprised if he doesn’t roll over. I don’t know if Manafort has similar vulnerability.

Jordan Orlando on April 12, 2018 at 4:48 pm

You’re forgetting that it’s all moot, because this is a “witch hunt” and “fake news.”

(Sorry; sometimes the sheer volume of Brechtian/Orwellian absurdity starts to get to me.)

astamari316 on April 13, 2018 at 12:49 am

Well, that’s good news then for Steve Stockman. Oh wait…

Oui on April 12, 2018 at 5:25 pm

Smiley … Stockman and the American Phoenix Foundation. Looks like this phoenix just perished in the fire.

○ Conservative group planted an intern in state lawmaker’s office, former intern testifies

Poor pro’s … worse tha the Watergate plumbers!

nasruddin on April 12, 2018 at 6:00 pm

5th amendment, so what? Can’t Mr Trump just keep pardoning him? Nobody’s going to call him to account.

oaguabonita on April 12, 2018 at 7:20 pm

I recently spent most hours of every day doing intense analysis of high-resolution (25-cm pixels) 3D aerial imagery. My prescriptions are up-to-date, but your eye muscles have to work hard to keep the stereo-imagery resolved into 3D vision while panning around and zooming in and out.

Think I had more migraines during those workdays than the entire rest of my life.

I feel your pain.

(Though, “luckily” for me, my migraines tend to be mostly just the “migraine aura” [visual distortion] lasting under a half-hour, with only very slight lingering headache as an aftereffect. Not the debilitating agony some people get with migraines. But of course until the aura passed, it was impossible to continue working.)

charon on April 12, 2018 at 7:53 pm

There is a breaking news story at Washington Post that Cohen had a proclivity for taping conversations, Trumpland is now worried FBI has the tapes.

charon on April 12, 2018 at 8:01 pm

This really is Stupis Watergate isn’t it?
- astamari316 on April 13, 2018 at 12:52 am
  
  I don’t know. If I were a lawyer who had been dealing with as shady a character as Trump for a really long time I might do some taping to protect myself. However, I would have kept them in a safe deposit box not in my hotel room. That’s being stupid.
  - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:43 am
    
    Well there is this found in the comments over at LGM ..
    
    The deal is this. Even if they didn’t find the tapes, now information that the tapes exist is out there. Mueller will subpoena to get them. Even if he has the tapes, he’ll cover his bases and issue a subpoena to see if there’s any more tapes.
    
    In fact, he’ll probably make that a general part of discovery with these people from now on.
    
    “These Are Not Very Bright Guys“
    - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:56 am
      
      You could Google “Alexander Butterfield” for some idea how this might go.
  - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:49 am
    
    A couple of excerpts from the Post:
    
    During the 2016 race, Cohen — who did not have a formal role on the campaign — had a reputation among campaign staff as someone to avoid, in part because he was believed to be secretly taping conversations.
    
    In one instance, Cohen played a recording of a conversation he had with someone else to a Trump campaign official to demonstrate that he was in a position to challenge that person’s veracity if necessary, an associate recalled.
    
    Cohen, who served for a decade as a lawyer at the Trump Organization and is a close confidant of Trump, was known to store the conversations using digital files and then replay them for colleagues, according to people who have interacted with him.
    
    “We heard he had some proclivity to make tapes,” said one Trump adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. “Now we are wondering, who did he tape? Did he store those someplace where they were actually seized? . . . Did they find his recordings?
    - charon on April 13, 2018 at 9:08 am
      
      Just going by the Post story, we can infer that:
      
      A) Enough people knew about the recordings that the FBI would have known of them before getting the search warrant.
      
      B) Cohen was keeping at least some readily accessible, not hidden away somewhere.
marduk on April 12, 2018 at 9:22 pm

There’s no way. Carefully curated tapes are your best bet. A limited hangout.

Parallax on April 12, 2018 at 4:44 pm

Cohen’s fucked either way because the State of New York will prosecute if he’s pardoned at the federal level. Guy is toast so I’d be surprised if he doesn’t roll over. I don’t know if Manafort has similar vulnerability.
Jordan Orlando on April 12, 2018 at 4:48 pm

You’re forgetting that it’s all moot, because this is a “witch hunt” and “fake news.”

(Sorry; sometimes the sheer volume of Brechtian/Orwellian absurdity starts to get to me.)
- astamari316 on April 13, 2018 at 12:49 am
  
  Well, that’s good news then for Steve Stockman. Oh wait…
Oui on April 12, 2018 at 5:25 pm

Smiley … Stockman and the American Phoenix Foundation. Looks like this phoenix just perished in the fire.

○ Conservative group planted an intern in state lawmaker’s office, former intern testifies

Poor pro’s … worse tha the Watergate plumbers!
nasruddin on April 12, 2018 at 6:00 pm

5th amendment, so what? Can’t Mr Trump just keep pardoning him? Nobody’s going to call him to account.
oaguabonita on April 12, 2018 at 7:20 pm

I recently spent most hours of every day doing intense analysis of high-resolution (25-cm pixels) 3D aerial imagery. My prescriptions are up-to-date, but your eye muscles have to work hard to keep the stereo-imagery resolved into 3D vision while panning around and zooming in and out.

Think I had more migraines during those workdays than the entire rest of my life.

I feel your pain.

(Though, “luckily” for me, my migraines tend to be mostly just the “migraine aura” [visual distortion] lasting under a half-hour, with only very slight lingering headache as an aftereffect. Not the debilitating agony some people get with migraines. But of course until the aura passed, it was impossible to continue working.)
charon on April 12, 2018 at 7:53 pm

There is a breaking news story at Washington Post that Cohen had a proclivity for taping conversations, Trumpland is now worried FBI has the tapes.
- charon on April 12, 2018 at 8:01 pm
  
  This really is Stupis Watergate isn’t it?
  - astamari316 on April 13, 2018 at 12:52 am
    
    I don’t know. If I were a lawyer who had been dealing with as shady a character as Trump for a really long time I might do some taping to protect myself. However, I would have kept them in a safe deposit box not in my hotel room. That’s being stupid.
    - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:43 am
      
      Well there is this found in the comments over at LGM ..
      
      The deal is this. Even if they didn’t find the tapes, now information that the tapes exist is out there. Mueller will subpoena to get them. Even if he has the tapes, he’ll cover his bases and issue a subpoena to see if there’s any more tapes.
      
      In fact, he’ll probably make that a general part of discovery with these people from now on.
      
      “These Are Not Very Bright Guys“
      - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:56 am
        
        You could Google “Alexander Butterfield” for some idea how this might go.
    - charon on April 13, 2018 at 8:49 am
      
      A couple of excerpts from the Post:
      
      During the 2016 race, Cohen — who did not have a formal role on the campaign — had a reputation among campaign staff as someone to avoid, in part because he was believed to be secretly taping conversations.
      
      In one instance, Cohen played a recording of a conversation he had with someone else to a Trump campaign official to demonstrate that he was in a position to challenge that person’s veracity if necessary, an associate recalled.
      
      Cohen, who served for a decade as a lawyer at the Trump Organization and is a close confidant of Trump, was known to store the conversations using digital files and then replay them for colleagues, according to people who have interacted with him.
      
      “We heard he had some proclivity to make tapes,” said one Trump adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. “Now we are wondering, who did he tape? Did he store those someplace where they were actually seized? . . . Did they find his recordings?
      - charon on April 13, 2018 at 9:08 am
        
        Just going by the Post story, we can infer that:
        
        A) Enough people knew about the recordings that the FBI would have known of them before getting the search warrant.
        
        B) Cohen was keeping at least some readily accessible, not hidden away somewhere.
- marduk on April 12, 2018 at 9:22 pm
  
  There’s no way. Carefully curated tapes are your best bet. A limited hangout.

The Future for Cohen and Manafort

About The Author

BooMan

14 Comments

Recent Posts

Recent Comments