Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz expressed disappointment with the Manhattan jury's decision to convict former President Trump on 34 charges of falsifying business records. Dershowitz criticized the jury for failing to act as a check and balance on the excesses of prosecutors and judges. He suggested that the jurors were hand-picked to be anti-Trump and were influenced by outside social and political pressures.
The prosecution argued that Trump falsified records to conceal a payment to Stormy Daniels, a pornographic performer, in an effort to silence her about an alleged affair in 2006. Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass presented evidence of an elaborate scheme by Trump and his cohorts, cloaked in lies, to defraud.
Dershowitz, along with other legal scholars, criticized the evidence presented and the law pertaining to the charges. He described the trial as a foregone conclusion, engineered from the beginning by a politician who campaigned on the promise to get Trump. Dershowitz raised concerns about the lack of checks and balances in the system of rule of law and warned of the dangers of weaponizing the criminal justice system against political enemies.
Former President Trump faces a maximum sentence of 136 years, with each count carrying a maximum of 4 years in prison. He is expected to appeal the ruling, but Dershowitz fears that the appellate judges may also fall into the same trap of targeting Trump. The sentencing is scheduled for July 11, just days before the Republican National Convention where Trump is expected to be nominated as the 2024 Republican presidential nominee.