Alina Habba, one of Donald Trump’s prominent lawyers, said this week that she believed the jurors in the Manhattan business fraud case “should have been sequestered” during Memorial Day weekend to prevent them from being influenced by the opinions of friends and family members they may have been spending the holiday with.
In an interview this week with Fox News, Habba said the members of the jury shouldn’t have been put in a situation where they could have been in contact with other people close to them who could influence their outlook in the case. The case they were dealing with, she said, is one that’s “completely unprecedented and unwarranted.”
After witness testimony concluded before the Memorial Day weekend, the trial went on a brief hiatus for the holiday. Everyone then returned this Tuesday for closing arguments, before the 12 jurors were sent to deliberate on the evidence presented to them.
Speaking with Fox News a few days before the verdict was handed down, Habba said she didn’t like how the jury was handled over that weekend. She commented:
“These are not sequestered jurors. They should have been sequestered because, in my opinion, these jurors are handling something that is completely unprecedented and unwarranted in America.
“And for them to be able to be out and about on a holiday weekend, with friends and families who have opinions who are watching the news, TVs on the background at the pool party — I have serious concerns.”
Habba continued that she believed it was possible for the jurors to hear something on a news media channel and then be influenced by that information as they headed back to the courtroom to hear the closing arguments.
Juan Merchan, the judge in the case, said that the Memorial Day holiday made so that there was “no way” to get closing arguments done before the weekend, which is why the trial was closed for a few days.
Habba added that she has “worries” about the jurors “going back to whatever friends might have Trump derangement syndrome, forgetting all sense of reality and coming back,” sitting in the jury box and feeling like they “need to take one for the DNC.”
She continued:
“I don’t want that. I want law to fact, because if we can get that, we will win. We will not just get a hung jury, we will get an acquittal.”
Of course, an acquittal did not happen, nor did a hung jury. The jury instead found Trump guilty on all 34 counts that were levied against him. As a result, Trump is now the first former president to be a convicted felon.
His fate is anything but sealed yet, though. Sentencing in the case has been scheduled for July 11.
Even after the sentence is handed down, it’s very likely that Trump’s legal team can delay it from being carried out while they appeal the conviction. And even if they aren’t successful with that appeal, it’s possible Trump doesn’t spend any time in jail at all.
