Plead 5th Amendment...

Michael Cohen to plead 5th Amendment in Stormy Daniels suit

In a bid to delay the case, President Trump’s personal lawyer tells a federal court he intends to assert his right not to incriminate himself.

By JOSH GERSTEIN

Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney, indicated on Wednesday that he planned to assert his Fifth Amendment rights not to testify in connection with a pending civil lawsuit brought by a porn star that seeks to void a $130,000 “hush money” deal Cohen allegedly cut to try to suppress her story in advance of the 2016 presidential election.

Cohen said in a declaration filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles that he planned to stay mum in that case because of a series of raids the FBI carried out at his home, office and hotel room in New York earlier this month. Executing search warrants, the agents seized a wide array of electronic devices and paper records about Cohen’s dealings.

“Based upon the advice of counsel, I will assert my 5th Amendment rights in connection with all proceedings in this case due to the ongoing criminal investigation by the FBI and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York,” Cohen wrote in the statement filed with Judge S. James Otero.

Lawyers for Cohen and President Donald Trump have asked for a 90-day stay of adult-film star Stormy Daniels’ civil suit in light of the pending criminal investigation. Attorneys for Cohen have said that among the records sought in the search warrants was information about the $130,000 payment at the core of the suit filed by Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

At a hearing last Friday, Otero deferred ruling on the stay request, saying he didn’t have enough information about the overlap between the civil case and the pending criminal investigation. The judge also said he had not heard directly from Cohen that he needed to assert his constitutional right not to incriminate himself.

Daniels’ attorney, Michael Avenatti, opposed delaying the civil case. He took to Twitter to say he was taken aback by the latest development, but did not say whether it would alter his client’s stand in court.

“This is a stunning development,” Avenatti wrote. “Never before in our nation’s history has the attorney for the sitting President invoked the 5th Amend in connection with issues surrounding the President. It is esp. stunning seeing as MC served as the “fixer” for Mr. Trump for over 10 yrs.”

The development came as lawyers in New York continue to wrangle over the records and electronic files seized in the raids against Cohen about two weeks ago. Attorneys for Cohen, Trump and the Trump Organization have tried to block prosecutors from reviewing the records, saying that the files may contain information protected by attorney-client privilege.

A federal judge in Manhattan, Kimba Wood, is considering whether to appoint an independent attorney as a “special master” to supervise the assessment of the records and the determination of what portions may be privileged. Lawyers for Cohen said in a filing in New York earlier on Wednesday that they expected to get some records from the government on Monday of this week, but that none had arrived so far.

Wood has set a hearing for Thursday to get updates on the status of Cohen’s records and systems the attorneys are putting in place to review them. A lawyer for Trump, Joanna Hendon, said in a court filing on Wednesday that her firm planned to rely on contract attorneys to wade through the records for potential privilege claims.