A federal judge on Wednesday declined to shorten Michael Cohen‘s post-prison monitoring for tax evasion, grilling the disbarred lawyer for “perjury” ahead of his expected testimony in the criminal hush money trial against former President Donald Trump.
Judge Jesse M. Furman in Manhattan questioned Cohen’s veracity in an order denying his request for early release from the court supervision that followed his three-year prison sentence for crimes including tax evasion, lying to banks and Congress, and violating campaign finance laws. The order marked a setback for Cohen and also raised questions about his “star witness” role in the forthcoming criminal trial against Trump.
The judge pointed to Cohen’s testimony at Trump’s civil fraud trial in state court last October, when he stated he wasn’t guilty for tax evasion despite pleading guilty to the charge in 2018. When asked during last fall’s testimony if he had lied to the federal judge who accepted his guilty plea, Cohen said, “Yes.”
Furman said Cohen’s testimony “gives rise to two possibilities: one, Cohen committed perjury when he pleaded guilty before Judge Pauley or, two, Cohen committed perjury in his October 2023 testimony.”
Furman’s decision means Cohen will still be under his three-year supervised release, which requires him to check in regularly with a federal probation officer who can monitor his whereabouts, employment, and living conditions, until November.
But the timing of the order this week could play handily for Trump’s legal team, which is likely to reference Furman’s decision at Trump’s hush money trial brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. The former president’s lawyers could use the order in an attempt to undermine Cohen’s reliability as a witness in front of jurors.
Bragg’s office is relying heavily on Cohen to testify about how Trump used him as a funnel for a $130,000 hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in an effort to prevent her from exposing an alleged 2006 affair between her and Trump in the final days of the 2016 presidential election.
Trump’s $420,000 reimbursement to Cohen is at the center of the criminal charges against the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, as he is facing 34 felony counts for allegedly faking business records to cover up the deal.
“Judge Furman confirmed what we already know: that Michael Cohen committed perjury and should be prosecuted,” said Trump attorney Alina Habba, who was a major player for Trump’s team during the separate civil fraud trial in New York against the Trump Organization. “As the Manhattan DA says on their website ‘one standard of justice for all.’”
Cohen’s attorney E. Danya Perry released a statement Wednesday clarifying that Furman’s scolding about perjury is “not a judicial determination” and criticized his holding as “both factually inaccurate and legally incorrect.”
“And Judge Furman ignores that Mr. Cohen has never disputed the underlying facts of his conduct, and also what many of Judge Furman’s own colleagues on the bench have long noted: that defendants often feel compelled to agree to coercive plea deals under severe pressure,” Perry added. “That is exactly what happened to Mr. Cohen.”
Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School, told the Washington Examiner that Furman’s order in the context of the hush money case “only highlights the overall weakness of his case.”
“Bragg is already bringing a novel case that many of us believe is dubious on the law. To support that with the likes of Michael Cohen only undermines the credibility of the case,” Turley said, while clarifying that it’s “not unusual” for prosecutors to use convicted felons as witnesses.
“What is unusual is to have a convicted felon who is continuing to be accused of perjury — that’s the problem with Cohen, is that his veracity has not improved,” Turley added.
Furman’s order comes two days after hush money trial Judge Juan Merchan ruled that Cohen and Daniels will be allowed to testify over Trump’s objections.
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Trump’s hush money trial, which is slated to be his first criminal trial ahead of three others that were initially expected to take place this year, was scheduled to begin on March 25, but a last-minute release of documents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York shifted the schedule.
Merchan delayed the trial until at least mid-April, and a hearing is now slated for Monday, when the judge, prosecutors, and defense attorneys will discuss the new documents and an updated schedule.
