Sunday, 31 January 2021

Trump's new legal team includes an attorney who declined to prosecute Bill Cosby and another who met with Jeffrey Epstein just days before his death

After five of his lawyers quit last week, former President Donald Trump announced a new legal team headed by Bruce Castor Jr. and David Schoen.
Schoen represented Roger Stone in his Mueller investigation trial, and was set to represent disgraced billionaire Jeffrey Epstein before he died by suicide.
Castor was criticized for declining to prosecute Bill Cosby in 2005 when he was DA of Montgomery County, PA.
Trump's previous legal team parted ways with the president over differences in strategy.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Just days after five members of former President Trump's impeachment legal team quit over a disagreement on strategy, two new lawyers - David Schoen and Bruce Castor Jr. - have been added to the roster.

The pair are expected to take the lead when Trump's impeachment trial for inciting the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol begins on February 8.

Castor served as the District Attorney of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, from 2002 to 2008. In 2005, Castor declined to prosecute Bill Cosby for the sexual assault of Andrea Constand. He claimed "insufficient, credible, and admissible evidence exists upon which any charge against Mr. Cosby could be sustained beyond a reasonable doubt," according to The Washington Post.

Years later, after Cosby had been accused by more than four dozen women of similar sexual crimes, Castor asserted that he'd verbally offered Cosby an immunity deal in which he declined to prosecute the former sitcom star in criminal court to ensure that Constand would be able to sue him in civil court.

His handling of the Cosby case is widely believed to be responsible for his failed reelection bid in 2015.

In fall 2020, Castor left his longtime private law firm for a personal injury and criminal defense-focused firm in Philadelphia.

David Schoen, an Atlanta-based criminal defense lawyer, was a part of Trump ally Roger Stone's defense team during his trial for witness tampering, obstructing an official proceeding, and making false statements in relation to Robert Mueller's Russia investigation. Schoen also met with disgraced mogul and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in the days before Epstein hanged himself in prison in August 2019.

Schoen has claimed that Epstein's death was not actually a suicide.

Trump's previous legal team, headed up by Butch Bowers and Deborah Barbier, reportedly clashed with the president over strategy. Bowers and Barbier wanted to focus on the constitutionality of impeaching a non-sitting president, while Trump was more interested in the false claims about widespread election fraud.

"I consider it a privilege to represent the 45th President," Castor said, via a press release from the office of the former president. "The strength of our constitution is about to be tested like never before in our history. It is strong and resilient. A document written for the ages, and it will triumph over partisanship yet again, and always."

Read the original article on Business Insider