Michael Cohen and Trump claimed a 'minuscule' amount of the documents reviewed in the lawyer's case as privileged - and experts are stunned
- President Donald Trump, his longtime lawyer Michael Cohen, and the Trump Organization have so far claimed just 252 documents seized during the raids on Cohen's home, office, and hotel room as privileged.
- This was a small number of the documents seized, and experts found this to be surprising.
- "For a person who claims to be a lawyer, the minuscule amount of allegedly privileged matter is is surprising, and what it tells us is that Cohen wasn't acting as a lawyer very often. He was doing something else."
President Donald Trump, his longtime lawyer Michael Cohen, and the Trump Organization have so far claimed just 252 documents seized during the raids on Cohen's home, office, and hotel room as privileged, according to a Tuesday report sent to the US District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Special master Barbara Jones, who was appointed to review the documents, wrote that more than 1.3 million documents that were provided to her so far were not marked as falling under attorney-client privilege. Some were turned over to federal prosecutors last week, and the majority of them will come into their hands on Wednesday.
That means a microscopic number of the documents - less than 0.0002% of the overall total that has been reviewed - are sought to be excluded from the criminal investigation into Cohen.
Experts said such a low number was stunning.
"What stands out to me is how very few of the items reviewed were even designated privileged by Cohen and Trump," Roland Riopelle, a former federal prosecutor with the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York and a partner at Sercarz & Riopelle, told Business Insider. "For a person who claims to be a lawyer, the minuscule amount of allegedly privileged matter is is surprising, and what it tells us is that Cohen wasn't acting as a lawyer very often. He was doing something else."
During a "Fox and Friends" interview last month, Trump seemed to suggest that the investigation into Cohen appeared to focus more on his business dealings than on his work as an attorney. But prior to that, Trump tweeted that "Attorney-client privilege is dead!" following the April raids.
'Her review is not a difficult one'
The information on privilege was provided by Jones, a former federal judge in Manhattan, in her most extensive update yet on the special master document review. US District Judge Kimba Wood appointed Jones in late April to oversee the review process after Cohen's lawyers demanded that privileged communications seized by the FBI were not reviewed by the government but by an outside consultant not directly affiliated with his potential prosecution.
Cohen, who has not been charged with a crime, is under criminal investigation in the Southern District of New York for possible campaign-finance violations and bank fraud. The next court date in his case is set for Wednesday morning.
In Jones's report, she wrote that, in addition to documents Cohen's side wants to claim as privileged, they can submit such designations for items that are "highly personal," such as medical records. Once Cohen and Trump claim privilege on a document, Jones will review the claim and make a recommendation to to the court on whether or not she believes the documents falls under such privilege and may be excluded from a potential prosecution.
Jones said eight boxes of hard-copy documents and certain phones and iPads have already been fully reviewed. The special master has also received documents from mobile storage devices, three computers, two phones, CDs found in those eight boxes, a video recorder, and electronic images. She said she has not received productions related to three seized items and does not know when to expect them.
In an earlier court filing on Tuesday, Jones billed $47,000 for her initial work on the case. The government is covering half of her fees while Cohen, Trump, and the Trump Organization are paying the other half.
Riopelle said those fees seem "very reasonable given the magnitude of the documentation involved in the case and the complexity of the issues."
"The relatively modest amount charged by" Jones, who is a partner at Bracewell, "confirms that there is very little privileged material for her to review and that her review is not a difficult one."
Meanwhile, Epner said that because disputed privileged items won't be turned over to federal prosecutors until all objections and appeals are exhausted, there is more "incentive" for Cohen and Trump to "carry the fight" to the circuit court - and even Supreme Court level - if Jones and Wood "decide that documents over which privilege is claimed are, in fact, not privileged."