Former attorney Michael Avenatti predicted the outcome of former President Trump’s hush money trial, which is set to begin next week.
In an interview with MSNBC from prison, Avenatti said he believes Trump will ultimately be convicted, though he noted the case has “problems”.
“You know, I think the case has a lot of problems. Now that does not —I don’t mean to suggest that that means that Trump will not be convicted because I think he will be convicted,” Avenatti said.
He also said it was inappropriate to try the case in state court.
“And I think it rests on a legally tenuous theory, namely that the crime that was attempted to be covered up was a federal election crime. I think that could be a problem potentially on appeal for the state,” he said.
As a result, he concluded, Trump’s conviction will likely be overturned on appeal.
“I believe if you’re going bring a case against a sitting president or a former president, who tens of millions of people support, especially in today’s day and age with how divided we are, I think it needs to be a rock-solid, lock tight, nearly perfect prosecuted case. Because otherwise, you run a huge risk as to what it’s going mean for the country,” he added.
Avenatti is currently serving four years in prison for siphoning book proceeds from his former client, Stormy Daniels.
Trump is facing 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal an alleged hush money payment Michael Cohen made on his behalf to Daniels.
The trial is scheduled to begin on April 15th after a New York judge denied Trump’s legal team’s attempt to postpone the trial until after the November elections.
Trump has pleaded not guilty and accused the prosecution of timing the case to interfere with his campaign and keep him off the trail.
Hope hes wrong
Doesn’t matter if he’s right or wrong. Their focus is damage. Hopefully trump has enough support capital to offset the damage they intend to inflict.