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Former Judge Chosen to Review Materials Seized From Michael Cohen Former Judge Chosen to Review Materials Seized From Michael Cohen
(about 5 hours later)
Barbara S. Jones, a lawyer who served as a federal judge in Manhattan, was selected on Thursday to oversee the process of screening materials seized in a recent F.B.I. raid from President Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael D. Cohen. Barbara S. Jones, a former federal judge, was selected on Thursday to oversee the process of screening materials seized in a recent F.B.I. raid from President Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael D. Cohen.
The selection of Ms. Jones to determine whether any of the materials are protected by attorney-client privilege appeared to resolve, at least for now, a dispute between lawyers for Mr. Cohen and President Trump and the government over who should get to review the materials and how the process should proceed. It has been two weeks since federal agents descended on Mr. Cohen’s office, apartment and hotel room and hauled away at least eight boxes of documents and more than a dozen cellphones, iPads and computer hard drives. But because the government and lawyers for Mr. Cohen and Mr. Trump have been sparring about whether the seized materials are privileged, the prosecutors working on the case have not yet been able to look at them.
The judge overseeing the dispute, Kimba M. Wood of Federal District Court, announced in a hearing that she was choosing Ms. Jones to serve as the special master in the case. The parties had submitted seven other possible candidates, including former magistrate judges and prosecutors. The selection of Ms. Jones, by a federal judge in Manhattan, to determine whether any of the materials are protected by attorney-client privilege appeared to resolve, at least for now, the dispute over who should be permitted to review the materials and how the process should proceed.
Ms. Jones served on the district court for 16 years, and before that worked as a federal prosecutor in the United States attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, the same office that is now investigating Mr. Cohen. She later was a senior aide to Robert M. Morgenthau, the former Manhattan district attorney. Bringing on Ms. Jones to serve as what is known as a special master could speed up the review, but it also introduced another layer of scrutiny — and thus a note of caution — to the process.
As a private lawyer, Ms. Jones has served as a monitor or a “neutral party” in disputes. In 2014, she was picked to hear the appeal by Ray Rice, a former Baltimore Ravens player, of the National Football League’s decision to suspend him over a domestic abuse case. The judge who selected her, Kimba M. Wood of Federal District Court, said that she had asked Ms. Jones how much time she could devote to the special master’s role. “She has committed 90 percent of her time to it and perhaps more if needed,” Judge Wood said.
She added, “If at any point it turns out that the special master review process is going too slowly, I’ll revisit the question of the scope of the special master’s role.”
At the hearing, prosecutors said that they had already started handing over portions of the seized materials to Mr. Cohen’s lawyers, a process that could take weeks to finish. Under a system laid out by Judge Wood, Mr. Cohen’s lawyers will now begin to screen them for attorney-client privilege and will pass on those records that pertain to Mr. Trump to his own lawyers, who will do the same.
At the same time, Ms. Jones will begin a simultaneous review, setting aside records that she herself concludes may be privileged. Each of the parties, Judge Wood said, will have the right to challenge decisions made by the others.
While highly technical, the findings about which records are privileged could shape the contours of the government’s investigation into Mr. Cohen. That inquiry is seeking to determine whether he broke the law by attempting to tamp down negative news coverage of the president in the run-up to the 2016 election.
Judge Wood made it clear that Ms. Jones was well positioned to serve as an arbiter. For 17 years, she served on the bench in the same courthouse where the Cohen case is now being heard. Before that, she worked as a prosecutor in the United States attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. Ms. Jones was also once a senior aide to Robert M. Morgenthau, the former Manhattan district attorney.
As a private lawyer, Ms. Jones has worked as a monitor or a “neutral party” in disputes. In 2014, she was picked to hear the appeal by Ray Rice, a former Baltimore Ravens player, of the National Football League’s decision to suspend him over a domestic-abuse case.
In the past week or so, Mr. Cohen has been shedding legal exposure in separate but related court cases. On Wednesday, he filed papers in California saying he planned to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in a lawsuit filed last month against President Trump by Stephanie Clifford, a former pornographic film star better known as Stormy Daniels, who claims she had an affair with the president.
Mr. Cohen has admitted to paying Ms. Clifford $130,000 in exchange for signing a nondisclosure agreement in October 2016, a month before the election. Ms. Clifford’s suit seeks to invalidate the agreement, alleging it was void because Mr. Trump never put his name to it.
Mr. Cohen also dropped two defamation lawsuits last week against the political research firm Fusion GPS and the website BuzzFeed related to their publication of the so-called Steele dossier, an intelligence report alleging ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. In the suits, Mr. Cohen had accused both companies of disseminating the dossier even though both knew that it contained what he described as lies.
All three moves may help Mr. Cohen avoid releasing documents or providing answers to probing questions that could have been used against him in the criminal investigation. That inquiry is said to be focusing not only on hush-money payments that Mr. Cohen made to Ms. Clifford, but also on his role in keeping quiet another woman who claims she had an affair with Mr. Trump, Karen McDougal, a former Playboy model.
On Thursday, Ms. Clifford’s lawyer, Michael Avenatti, filed a motion on her behalf to formally intervene in Mr. Cohen’s case in New York.
In the motion, Mr. Avenatti said that Ms. Clifford’s former lawyer, Keith Davidson, had communicated with Mr. Cohen about hush-money payments he had made to her, and that records of those dealings were now in the hands of prosecutors. Mr. Davidson confirmed last week that he was contacted by federal authorities after the raids on Mr. Cohen, and that he had shared some of his records with the government.
Judge Wood declined to rule from the bench on Ms. Clifford’s motion to intervene. And when asked in court what he and Ms. Clifford wanted, Mr. Avenatti admitted that it wasn’t much.
“A seat at the table,” he said.