Manhattan DA needs to detail its Trump investigation
By Norman Eisen, E. Danya Perry and Joshua Perry / Special To The Washington Post
Mark Pomerantz and Carey Dunne, the well-respected prosecutors who led the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office investigation into former president Donald Trump’s business dealings, have left the building.
And the leak of Pomerantz’s resignation letter excoriating District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s decision to drop what the prosecutors believed was a meritorious case means they’ve gone out with a bang. Under these unusual circumstances, Bragg should stop saying that his office continues to conduct the investigation into Trump; unless it’s really ongoing. That doesn’t seem to be the case, in light of the noisy resignation of the veteran prosecutors, the shuttering of the grand jury next month, and the reported return of evidence to witnesses. If the investigation is really closed, the better practice would be — within constraints prosecutors are obligated to observe, like grand jury secrecy — to offer the public an explanation of what happened, and why.
Pomerantz’s resignation letter makes clear that Bragg made the decision to end a long-standing investigation over the objections of line prosecutors. Pomerantz is a prosecutor with formidable expertise in complicated cases, like the one the office was reportedly building against Trump, and the veteran litigator is not known for hyperbole or grandstanding. The letter stated his belief that “we have evidence sufficient to establish Mr. Trump’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Although we do not have access to all the evidence prosecutors reviewed, both exculpatory and inculpatory, the public record betrays a strong case for bringing an indictment. Two of us explained why in a lengthy report last year, concluding that Trump faced liability for offenses including falsifying business records.
https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/comment-manhattan-da-needs-to-detail-its-trump-investigation/
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