- Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance has convened a special grand jury to hear evidence about potential charges against members of the Trump Organization, and potentially the Trump family. Reached for comment, the former president said, "Absolutely everyone says my
juries are the grandest juries anyone has ever seen. anyone has ever seen. Big, beautiful juries the likes of which Big, beautiful juries the likes of which no one has ever seen. My juries are at least
100 grand, everyone says." So, what is a grand
jury in the first place? And is Donald Trump really
in trouble this time or what? Well, it kinda. - [Advertiser] Sponsored by Ting Mobile. - Hey, LegalEagles. It's time to think like
a District Attorney. Now, what are the
responsibilities of grand jurors? How much influence does
the prosecutor have? And what is the situation
for Trump and his employees? Today, we're gonna learn the ins and outs of the grand jury process in New York. But the first question is, "How easy is it to indict
someone with a grand jury?" Well, former New York State
Chief Judge Sol Wachtler once said the prosecutors
had so much control over the grand jury that by and large, they could get them to
indict a ham sandwich. Now this phrase has become shorthand for prosecutors' ability
to get grand juries to do whatever they want. And as we'll discuss
later on in this video, that control can go both ways. And ironically, Wachtler
himself was later indicted for hush money payments to a mistress. But back to the story at hand,
what is going on with Trump? Well, the Washington Post reported that a Manhattan grand jury had
recently started to meet to review potential charges against the Trump organization
and its principles. So this information is not entirely new. Vance's office has been investigating the Trump organization for about two years. We don't know all of the
details, but tax fraud and campaign finance violations
are both on the table. Former Trump lawyer, Michael Cohen, has been interviewed eight times by Vance's office. And Cohen has discussed
hush money payments he allegedly made to Trump's mistresses. In addition to providing background on how Trump's businesses were operated. Last year, I did a video about the explosive allegations of Trump tax fraud by the New York Times. Vance's office as believed to
be looking at whether Trump or his employees lied
about the value of assets to gain favorable loan
terms and tax benefits. Vance's investigation got
a boost earlier this year after the Supreme Court ruled that Trump had to turn over eight
years of tax records. Reports say that these
records include both the final and draft version of tax returns. And this information
would be central to any determination that Trump
himself had criminal liability especially with regards
to his mental state when these financial documents were filed. And as we discussed in the
video about Trump's taxes, it's not easy to prove tax fraud. Tax fraud turns on whether
the person filing the return knew that they were committing fraud. Powerful people like CEOs and Mob Bosses are usually pretty savvy
about speaking in code and shifting responsibility
to others in the hierarchy, like Cohen or CFO of
the Trump organization, Allen Weisselberg, for instance. I mean we don't know what
is actually happening inside the Trump
organization at this time. But that's why we should be wary about drawing from conclusions about whether the grand jury
will find evidence that Trump had an intent to commit crimes. But it is a possibility. So the question is,
"What is this grand jury that's looking at Trump
actually doing right now?" Well, first we have to start
with what is a grand jury? A grand jury is a group of citizens who must decide whether
there's enough evidence for a person to be charged with a crime. It's a very different proceeding than the jury trials you're
probably used to seeing on TV. So, let's start with the difference between a petit jury and a grand jury. A Petit Jury is convened to decide whether someone has committed a crime or a defendant has civil liability. Petit juries listened to
the evidence presented by both parties during a trial, and then return a verdict. If a Petit jury finds the defendant guilty then there'll be sentenced typically with a fine imprisonment
or combination of both. A Petit jury is the jury
that you're probably used to seeing on TV. In contrast, a grand jury does not determine someone's guilt or innocence. It also has no involvement in civil cases. This is a purely criminal issue. A grand jury hears evidence
presented by a prosecutor that jury must determine whether there is probable cause to believe that the person or entity
has committed a crime. If the grand jury decides
that there is probable cause, then it will file a written
statement of a charge. This is called an "indictment". If the grand jury finds
probable cause then, the defendant will be
formally charged with a crime. And potentially there will
be an actual criminal trial to determine their guilt or innocence. Now this isn't the way that it happens in every case or in every state. Some states use what's
called an information which is basically just
an indictment that comes directly from the District Attorney with no need for the
involvement of a grand jury. But let's talk about New York law. In the New York constitution, Article 1 Section 6 says that, "No defendant may be tried
for a felony without the case first having been
presented to a grand jury." A New York grand jury is composed of between 23 and 16 people. These people are summoned
the same way that anyone is for jury duty, with
a notice from a County Clerk. The jurors usually have to serve a term that ranges from between two
weeks and several months. And a special grand jury can
meet for up to six months. And since this proceeding doesn't
determine someone's guilt, it only determines whether there's probable cause for an indictment. You don't have a lot of the safeguards that you would normally have
in a full blown criminal trial. For example, under New York
law, there's no judge presiding in the room during the
grand jury proceedings. The prosecutor's in charge
and is therefore responsible for presenting the government's case and reading the law to the grand jury. This means that Cy Vance's
office has two roles. First, presenting evidence as a District Attorney for Manhattan and advising the grand jury about process. The DA takes on the role of a judge by advising the jury and ruling on the admissibility of evidence
and answering questions. Hopefully the DA will act in good faith but if he believes that
there's probable cause, he's going to present evidence
advocating for an indictment. This is why grand juries are so one-sided. So, who is in this
secretive grand jury room? Well, usually it's the jurors, the prosecutor, and a court reporter. Witnesses are only
present during questioning the defendant and his or her lawyers are generally not present but will get to an exception to that. And when the jury deliberates, the prosecutors and court
reporter leave the room. Grand jurors can ask questions which is something that doesn't happen during criminal trial proceedings. However, the prosecutor
then puts on the judge hat and decides whether the
question is relevant. And in a federal grand jury, yes, the federal prosecutors are
bound by a similar procedure. The prosecutor is not constrained by the rules of evidence that applied during the criminal trial. But in New York, the prosecutor
is bound by the state's rules of evidence with a
few noteworthy exceptions which give more leeway
for hearsay testimony. If someone is indicted
based on hearsay testimony, prosecutors will then have to develop non-hearsay evidence
for the criminal case. Now, I know this sounds
incredibly one sided, but remember, there's still a
criminal trial get to happen. This is only deciding about a potential indictment and traditionally, a potential defendant
had no right to testify in his or her defense in
front of a grand jury. But, defendants in New
York do have a right to testify before the grand jury. But, this is almost never a good idea because the bar is so
low to get an indictment. For example, New York
criminal procedure law Section 190.50 provides
that a potential defendant must be permitted to
testify before a grand jury. But, the potential defendant has to sign and submit a waiver of
immunity and a waiver of his or her fifth amendment right
against self-incrimination. And there's very little benefit to testifying before a grand jury. A potential defendant
won't know the extent of the government's case against them. And unlike a criminal trial process where the evidence has established
well in advance of trial. And the prosecutor has
an obligation to give that evidence to the defendants. Here, the person's testimony could tip off the prosecutor about additional
evidence and witnesses. And potentially worst
of all, the defendant's testimony could also be used
in a future criminal trial. Meaning that the evidence
the person blindly offers during a grand jury proceeding could be highly damning and
used against them in the future. Believe me, former
President Trump does not want to testify before any grand jury. Even though, as I'm sure he would say the testimony would be
beautiful, perfect testimony. And perhaps most importantly
at the conclusion of the proceedings, jurors will vote on whether there is probable cause that the potential
defendant committed a crime. They vote on whether to return
what is called a "true bill" authorizing prosecutors
to indict the defendant. And in the grand jury, prosecutors don't need
a unanimous grand jury and affirmative vote
of just 12 grand jurors is enough to authorize an indictment. And if 12 jurors don't believe enough evidence exists to charge a person, then they can return
what's called a "no bill" which prevents indictment
but, that's pretty unlikely. But either way, everything
related to the proceeding is supposed to just to
be sealed and secret, which is interesting given that there were leaks with it led to the Washington Post reporting that the grand jury exists and is in process. But let's talk about secrecy in these grand jury proceedings. Both state and federal grand juries are conducted in secrecy. The Supreme COurt has laid out many reasons for secret proceedings. Number 1, prevents the
escape potential defendants. It ensures that the
jurors are not pressured by their friends or
threatened with retaliation by potential defendants. It discourages perjury and encourages people to testify without fear. And it protects potential defendants who are not yet indicted
from the disclosure that they were investigated for a crime. Under New York law, the prosecutor and jurors are
not allowed to reveal anything about the presentation,
including testimony or voting. It's a felony to disclose
grand jury information. However, the secrecy
doesn't extend to witnesses. So, the hundred thousand dollars question, "Is an indictment against members of the Trump family imminent?" Well, a few words of caution about reports that Donald Trump is about to be indicted. First of all, Donald
Trump is potentially not the only target of this probe. He may not even be a target of this probe. Officers of the company, Don Jr. And CFO Allen Weisselberg
could be implicated as could Ivanka or Trump sisters. And of course, in a similarly
analogous situation, people over-invested in
the Mueller investigation only to be let down
when Mueller interpreted his mandate very, very narrowly. Saying that he wasn't
allowed to say whether Trump committed a crime or not which is a source of great
controversy to this day. And Cy Vance is not exactly
Captain America either. In January 2020, advocates
called on Vance to resign because of his pattern of allowing wealthy and powerful
defendants off the hook. Vance declined to prosecute
Harvey Weinstein in 2015. He also allegedly bungled a case against OB GYN, Robert Hadden, who allegedly abused dozens of patients. Vance arrested Hadden in 2012,
but his arrest was voided and he was allowed to continue practicing. Evelyn Yang, the wife of
New York mayoral candidate Andrew Yang, said that she
was one of Hadden's victims and she's blasted Vance along with many of the other victims, as well. Now, sources didn't exactly say how long the grand jury has been meeting. A special grand jury proceeding last for no longer than six months. If recently means they
started a few weeks ago, then we could be waiting several months before anything happens. If we ever see anything at all. If they started to meet five months ago, an indictment or not, might be a minute. Though, that seems unlikely. However, if you're looking for clues consider that it was just last week that we learned that New York
Attorney General, Tish James, now has two lawyers working with the Manhattan district attorney. It's relatively unusual for the Attorney General's office to team up with the local district attorney. They're often turf wars and apparently that's not happening here. And the revelation came
right after James announced that the state's civil investigation of the Trump organization has evolved into a criminal matter. We don't know why it's criminal but it may have something
to do with evidence that was developed during the ongoing Manhattan grand jury process. But remember, I mentioned
that it's often extremely easy to manipulate the grand
jury process by prosecutors. That also means the
prosecutors can manipulate it in the other direction,
away from an indictment if that's what they want to do. If they would actually
prefer not to indict someone. And we've already seen
this in many police cases, such as the case involving
the death of Breonna Taylor. Kentucky Attorney General, Daniel Cameron, is in hot water for allegedly lying about what he presented to a grand jury and allegedly sandbagging
his own efforts to procure an indictment in that case. But, it certainly looks like Vance wants to indict someone. But we can't assume anything right now including the identity of that person. Vance announced that he's stepping down at the end of the year, which
is kind of a strange move for someone who was about to bring the highest profile case
of his entire lifetime. But at the end of the day, if you have personally
witnessed illegal activity by the Trump organization or its members you should call the authorities. And you can save money on that call by switching to Ting Mobile. I personally switched to Ting Mobile and have saved literally
hundreds of dollars a month. I'm not kidding here. Why? Because of this. Yes, that is a real cell
phone bill that I got with my previous provider. And it's why I personally
switched to Ting. And Ting Mobile has three brand new plans to make sure that this
never happens again. All of Ting's plans have
unlimited talk and text starting at just $10 per month. Add data for as little as $5 per gigabyte, or choose a set of data or just go full unlimited for $45 a month. Switching plans is really, really easy because you can keep
your same phone number and use pretty much any phone. And the service is great too because Ting partners with
several massive networks. Probably the very same one
that you're using right now, but at a huge discount. They literally use the
same infrastructure. Now, actually, I can't tell you which ones because I always respect contracts. But let's just say that my
service hasn't changed at all. And it's incredibly
easy to transfer service using the exact same phone
number you have right now. You just order a Ting SIM
card, pop it in and set it up. You don't even have to call anyone. It's like magic. So if you go to legaleagle.ting.com or click on the link in the description, you can use your last bill to compare just how much you would save. And LegalEagles will also get a $25 service credit that could
cover two months of service. So just click on the link in the description and give it a try. Plus, clicking on that link
really helps out this channel. So, do you agree with my analysis? Leave your objections in the comments and check out this other
LegalEagle video right here. I think you're really going to like it. So click on this video
or I'll see you in court.
I wish
https://youtu.be/EIWHvPP0U64
Iran has outstanding warrants. To drop Trump off in Iran would be massive step toward reconciliation for the US Air Force. And the single biggest blow we could deliver to MAGA. It would be great for foreign policy.
Literally no downsides.