Stanley Woodward, the attorney representing indicted Trump personal assistant Walt Nauta, accused special counsel Jack Smith of taking “improper” actions to flip a key witness in the Mar-a-Lago documents case, Reuters reported on Wednesday.
According to Reuters, Woodward acknowledged in a court filing that Smith had reached a deal with Woodward’s former client, Mar-a-Lago IT manager Yuscil Taveras, to testify as part of the prosecution’s case against the former president.
Woodward said that Taveras’ decision to cooperate with the prosecution came about after prosecutors threatened Taveras with criminal charges for allegedly lying to a grand jury.
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Although prosecutors said that Taveras changed his tune only after facing the prospect of criminal charges, Woodward said in his filing that Taveras “provided new testimony to the grand jury only after being offered a non-prosecution deal, which was reached after he was no longer representing the employee.”
Trump is currently facing an unprecedented four criminal indictments in four different jurisdictions for a range of alleged crimes including mishandling of top-secret government documents, conspiring to defraud the United States by trying to remain in power after losing the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, and committing business fraud while making hush-money payments to an adult film star.
Trump was also impeached on two separate occasions during his only term in office and was found liable by a jury earlier this year for defaming and sexually abusing journalist E. Jean Carroll.
