Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz said Friday that a Manhattan jury "failed" after the conviction of former President Trump on 34 charges of falsifying business records.
"My big disappointment is with the jury. Juries are supposed to be a check and balance on the excesses of prosecutors and judges. This jury failed its role of checking and balancing these excesses," Dershowitz said on "Mornings with Maria" Friday.
A New York jury found former Trump guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business brought against him by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg in a historic trial. Trump is now the first U.S. president to be convicted of a crime, and reactions are pouring in.
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Dershowitz labeled the decision the "beginning of a war of weaponization of the criminal justice system." He also heavily scrutinized the 12-person jury, noting many were likely non-Trump voters.
"They were hand-picked by the judge and by the prosecutor to be anti-Trump. These were get-Trump jurors," he explained.
"These were jurors who voted between 85 and 90% not to allow Trump to be president, and they will do anything to prevent him from being president. And so their vote was the second vote on November against him being president. It wasn't a vote on the facts of the law of the case."
Prosecutors needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump falsified those records to conceal a $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, a pornographic performer, in the lead-up to the 2016 election to silence her about an alleged affair with Trump in 2006.
During the final stages of the trial Tuesday, Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass delivered his closing argument for more than five hours, saying the prosecution has presented "powerful" evidence in their case against Trump.
Steinglass said Trump’s intent to defraud "could not be any clearer," arguing that it would have been far easier for him to pay Stormy Daniels directly. Instead, the prosecutor said, he concocted an elaborate scheme and everything he and his cohorts did was "cloaked in lies."
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Dershowitz joined a host of other legal scholars in criticizing the evidence brought forth against Trump and the law pertaining to the charges.
"The facts of the law of the case here are an absolute joke," he reasoned. "This was essentially a directed verdict of guilt by the judge, by giving them the multiple-choice defense."
"As soon as Bragg indicted, we knew there was going to be a conviction. It was a foregone conclusion. So yesterday's result is not news. It was just the end result of a completely predictable injustice that was engineered from the very beginning by a politician who had campaigned on the promise to get Trump."
With the trial taking place in a deep-blue city and state, Dershowitz also noted the jury may have been influenced by outside social and political pressures.
"Every judge understands that if you're perceived as doing anything in favor of Trump, in a city like New York, particularly in Manhattan, your life is over. And every juror understood that. Every judge understood that," he told host Maria Bartiromo.
Each of the 34 counts carries a maximum prison sentence of 4 years. In total, Trump faces a maximum sentence of 136 years. It is expected former President Trump will appeal the ruling, but Dershowitz fears "the appellate judges will fall into the same get-Trump trap and we'll see no checks and balance on our system of rule of law."
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The former president's sentencing is scheduled for July 11, just four days before the start of the Republican National Convention, where he is expected to be formally nominated as the 2024 Republican presidential nominee.
"This is so dangerous to all Americans. Today it's get Trump. Tomorrow, it's get you. Tomorrow, it's get me. Tomorrow, it's get your loved one," he said.
"The American system has been weaponized against political enemies, and that is a great loss for all Americans."
Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
