Bragg Paralegal Admits Call Records Deleted

Alvin Bragg, you have a problem.

This week, a paralegal from Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s office made a rather astonishing admission.

Jaden Jarmel-Schneider confirmed that some phone records in the Trump case had been deleted.

Is That Legal?

There is a pesky little rule during a criminal trial that requires the prosecution to turn over its evidence to the defense so there are no surprises.

In this case, however, it would appear that Bragg’s office decided to not include everything it had uncovered during its investigation.

Bragg’s paralegal confirmed that some phone records that were part of the investigation were deleted and not included in the materials turned over to the Trump defense team.

At the heart of the missing documentation are Michael Cohen's phone records.

In particular, there is a call that ended quite abruptly during the discussion of the Karen McDougal payment that has Trump’s defense team thinking that the tape may have been doctored.

The prosecution has countered that the call in question was cut short because Cohen ended the call due to another call coming in.

The AP reported, “Records show Cohen received a phone call about 22 seconds after the recording was cut off, according to Jarmel-Schneider’s testimony.

“Prosecutors seem to be eliciting the testimony to back up their claim that the recording wasn’t edited, but was cut short after Cohen received an incoming call.”

Trump and his surrogates are already talking about a mistrial over this, but Judge Merchan is unlikely to grant such a motion.

Having said that, this is yet more ammunition for Trump to use if he loses the case and files an appeal.

To this point, I still firmly believe that Trump would win an appeal, or, at the very least, have any penalty significantly reduced.

I just don’t see this being the case that puts Trump in jail.