Mueller seeks to bar Manafort from tying charges to Trump campaign role

Last edited Fri Jun 22, 2018, 08:02 PM - Edit history (1)

Source: Politico

Special counsel Robert Mueller's team is seeking to prevent the defense for Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign chairman, from arguing to jurors that he was targeted for prosecution because of his role in Donald Trump's presidential bid.

In a court filing on Friday, prosecutors asked a federal judge in Alexandria, Virginia, to bar any selective prosecution claims during Manafort's looming trial on tax evasion, bank fraud and other charges.

"Manafort should ... be precluded from arguing that he has been singled out for prosecution because of his position in the campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump, or otherwise asserting that he has been selectively prosecuted by the Special Counsel's Office," Mueller's team wrote.

Prosecutors noted that Manafort never filed a legal motion asking for the case to be dismissed on selective-prosecution grounds.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/22/robert-mueller-paul-manafort-trump-campaign-665898

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Mueller is attempting to avoid jury nullification by preempting any attempt to introduce issues that would take the jury's focus off Manafort's alleged crimes.

Good for him, trying to head off Manafort's lawyers at the pass. It would be very hard for jurors to unhear prejudicial statements that they shouldn't be hearing. This will put the lawyers on notice.

From Mueller's filing:

https://www.politico.com/f/?id00000164-28ed-dd88-af77-faef029d0000

2. Under the foregoing principles, Manafort should be precluded from presenting to the
jury evidence or argument concerning several of the issues mentioned above that were raised in
his pretrial motions and that, if reasserted at trial, would serve primarily as a basis for jury
nullification or otherwise confuse the jury.

To begin with, Manafort should be barred from arguing or suggesting in questions to witnesses that the conduct charged in the superseding indictment does not relate to the Special Counsel's mandate. Manafort's argument on that point forms the basis for a motion to dismiss that has been fully briefed and remains pending before the Court. See Docs. 30, 32, and 40. Regardless of how the Court decides that motion, the boundaries of the Special Counsel's authority are irrelevant to the jury's consideration of whether the evidence proves the elements of the tax, foreign account, and bank fraud offenses. And even if (contrary to fact) such an argument had some probative value, that value would be substantially outweighed by the risk of misleading or confusing the jury. See Fed. R. Evid. 403.

Manafort should also be precluded from arguing that he has been singled out for prosecution because of his position in the campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump, or otherwise asserting that he has been selectively prosecuted by the Special Counsel's Office. Manafort elected not to make that claim in a pretrial motion.* Courts have consistently held that claims of selective (or vindictive) prosecution must be presented to the court before trial and cannot be argued to the jury.

SNIP

In a similar vein, the Court should bar Manafort from incorrectly suggesting--as he has in pretrial filings, see Doc. 30-1 at 16, 23-24; Doc. 40 at 13--that prosecutors in this case have resurrected charges that the Department of Justice previously investigated but declined to prosecute or determined not to be meritorious. Any such argument would be misleading to the extent it suggests that the Department ceased investigating Manafort before the appointment of the Special Counsel and had decided not to bring charges against him. I