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‘Lacks Courage’: Experts Question Why Alvin Bragg ‘Stood Down’ on Trump Criminal Case After Bombshells in Civil Suit

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New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg is yet again under fire for appearing to have dropped the longtime criminal investigation into Donald Trump and his real estate empire, after New York Attorney General Tish James announced a bombshell civil suit against Trump and his family members for many of the same acts the criminal case was presumed to cover.

Bragg, a former Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York (SDNY), took office on January 1, 2022, after winning election following the retirement of Cyrus Vance, Jr. Many had expected Vance to file charges, but almost immediately Bragg was accused of slow-walking the last portion of the investigation. By February 23, the investigation’s top two prosecutors abruptly quit.

The news rocked the country and New York.

READ MORE: NY AG Referring Criminal Charges Against Trump to the Feds, Alleges He ‘Grossly Inflated’ Net Worth by ‘Billions’

One day later The New Yorker’s award-winning investigative reporter, Jane Mayer, wrote: “After promising to prioritize the case, the new Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, seems to have abandoned it.”

Indeed, despite Bragg’s claim months later, that the case was still active, charges have yet to be filed.

On Wednesday, after AG James sued Trump, his three eldest children – Donald Jr., Eric, and Ivanka – several of his companies, and people associated with his business including former CFO Allen Weisselberg, many are turning their attention to Bragg.

Many believed Vance had come close to filing charges. As far back as 2019, as investigative reporter David Farenthold (then at The Washington Post and now of The New York Times) reported, they had already found plenty, he notes today.

Anger online against Bragg is palpable, given all that James revealed.

READ MORE: ‘He Knew Nothing About So Many Things’: Trump White House Staffers Were ‘Startled’ by His Ignorance

Tish James’ “massive case also raises real questions about why [Bragg] stood down on this same case on the criminal side, to the point where two prosecutors quit,” tweeted MSNBC anchor Joy Reid.

Clearly aware of the optics and possibly the blowback brewing online Bragg, one hour after James’ press conference ended, claimed that his investigation remains “ongoing.”

Legal experts too are stunned.

“The more I read about the NY AG civil fraud case against Trump, the more I wonder how Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg could possibly have rejected indicting him for criminal fraud,” writes Tristan Snell, an attorney formerly in the NY AG’s office who prosecuted the Trump University case.

Attorney Luppe B. Luppen in 2020 reported on James’ investigation into Trump, and in June of this year at his Substack newsletter wrote: “What’s Really Stopping a Trump Prosecution?

On Wednesday he observed “NYAG Tish James’s office remains unimpressed with the performance of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg in their parallel investigations.”

Law professor Jennifer Taub says she’s “Wondering whether this puts pressure on Alvin Bragg to act.”

“Much of what [James] is describing is EXACTLY what Cy Vance was investigating.”

Attorney, political commentator, and former South Carolina state lawmaker Bakari Sellers says Bragg “has abdicated his duty and/or lacks the courage to do his job.”

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CRIME

AG Pam Bondi Says Tesla Vandals Could Get 20 Years In Prison

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U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Thursday that, if convicted, the Tesla vandals who lit the electric cars and charging stations ablaze could get up to 20 years in prison.

“The days of committing crimes without consequence have ended,” Bondi said. “Let this be a warning: if you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars.”

Bondi announced the charges against three alleged Tesla vandals. All of the defendants are accused of using Molotov cocktails. Two defendants, one in Salem, Oregon and another in Loveland, Colorado, allegedly attacked Tesla dealerships. A third allegedly burned Tesla charging stations in Charleston, South Carolina.

READ MORE: Fox News Reporter Challenges Trump on Promoting Tesla While Americans Are ‘Struggling’

Though Bondi’s statement did not identify any of the defendants or reveal the charges levied against them, the Department of Justice said the penalty ranged from five to 20 years in prison. Bondi has previously characterized the attacks on Tesla dealerships as “nothing short of domestic terrorism” according to ABC News.

The three anonymous defendants cited by Bondi are not the only alleged Tesla vandals. Earlier this week, a Tesla service center in Las Vegas was hit, as was a dealership in Kansas City, Missouri according to Electrek.

Tesla dealerships have seen an increase of protests as many left-leaning figures are calling for boycotts against the company. Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, is also the leader of the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Despite the name, DOGE is not an official department of the U.S. government, as it was not established by Congress. DOGE is behind the recent mass firings of government workers.

Outside of the peaceful protests, vandals have spray-painted anti-DOGE and anti-Tesla graffiti on Tesla cars and dealerships. The number of arsons at dealerships has also been increasing of late, leading Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner to suggest that arsonists could face the death penalty, according to Mediaite.

“What happens if there’s someone in one of these cars they blow up? That can happen! That becomes murder! Or worse. Terrorism plus! And I know that on January 20th, the president signed into law, into, through an executive order, restoring the death penalty. Do you think this sort of thing… And I hate to think it! People leave their children and pets in cars. I mean, you don’t know! This is deadly dangerous stuff these liberal protesters are playing with!” Faulkner said.

There have been no reports of Teslas being lit on fire with anyone nearby. The Teslas set on fire have primarily been at dealerships after business hours, times when no one would be in the cars, making Faulkner’s scenario unlikely.

Image via Reuters

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CRIME

Trump Loses E. Jean Carroll Appeal Two Days After Sharing Meme Saying She Should Be Jailed

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A three-judge panel has upheld the ruling that awarded E. Jean Carroll $5 million from President-elect Donald Trump. Two days prior, Trump shared a meme saying she should go to jail.

The ruling came from the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The Manhattan-based court upheld all of the original ruling. Trump’s lawyers had “not demonstrated that the district court erred in any of the challenged rulings. Further, he has not carried his burden to show that any claimed error or combination of claimed errors affected his substantial rights as required to warrant a new trial,” the judges wrote.

Carroll said that Trump raped her at a Bergdorf Goodman store dressing room. Trump denied the claim, and accused Carroll of perpetrating a hoax to promote her book. He repeatedly said that not only did he not know her, she wasn’t his “type.”

READ MORE: E. Jean Carroll Talks About ‘Zero’ Trump in Court and Reveals How She Will Use Jury Award

The original ruling found that though the standard of “rape” was not reached, Trump was liable for sexual assault. The court awarded Carroll $2.02 million for sexual assault, plus an additional $2.98 million for defamation, according to Reuters.

In the appeal, Trump’s lawyers objected to allowing testimony from other women who said Trump sexually assaulted them. His lawyers also objected to allowing jurors to hear the infamous Access Hollywood tape that went public in 2016 where Trump bragged about being able to grab women by their genitalia. On the tape, Trump says, “When you’re a star, they let you do it.”

The appellate court ruled that this evidence was indeed legal for the jury to hear.

“This Court has long taken an ‘inclusionary’ approach… under which other act evidence is admissible unless it is introduced for the sole purpose of showing a defendant’s bad character,” the court wrote.

Two days before the ruling, Trump shared a meme on his Truth Social account, which suggested Carroll should go for jail for making false accusations.

e. jean carroll

The meme reshared by Trump on Saturday. (Screenshot/Truth Social)

The meme reads “Should a woman go to jail for falsely accusing a man of rape? Retruth if you want justice for Trump.”

This meme could prove problematic for Trump. Trump’s been hit by additional lawsuits from Carroll for defamation, when he continued to say she made up her assault story. This January, a court ruled that Trump had to pay her an additional $83.3 million for defamation; the appeal in that case is still pending.

The case was at the center of another scandal. This December, ABC News was criticized for deciding to settle with Trump for $16 million when he sued for defamation. That case hinged on a March 2024 report from George Stephanopoulos that said Trump had been found liable for rape.

Some legal experts criticized ABC News for settling, saying that it could have won the case. However, some reporting suggests that ABC News was worried about what could be uncovered during the discovery phase of the trial.

Image via Shutterstock

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Alabama Teen Randall Adjessom Was Shot In Home By Cops Looking For Brother’s Marijuana

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Randall Adjessom, 16, was shot to death last year by the Mobile, Alabama Police Department’s S.W.A.T. team. The police were looking for marijuana allegedly owned by Adjessom’s older brother—who not only wasn’t there, but didn’t live at that home.

The Adjessom family filed suit last week against the Mobile Police Department. The officers shot Adjessom four times during a no-knock raid, according to the Associated Press. The no-knock warrant was issued as part of a investigation against his older brother for marijuana possession and distribution, despite not living at the address raided. No one at the address, which included Adjessom’s mother, aunt, grandmother and sisters, was a suspect.

Police say that Adjessom was armed with a laser-sighted pistol, according to WALA-TV. His family doesn’t dispute that he had a gun, but said it was “to protect his mother, grandmother, aunt, and sisters from the unknown intruders breaching his childhood home,” according to the Miami Herald. As soon as he saw the intruders were police officers, he put his hands up, the lawsuit said. An officer then shot him four times in the torso. Police body camera footage confirms that Adjessom had his hands up, the Herald reported.

READ MORE: ‘Reefer Madness’: Fox News Freakout as Biden Announces Pardons for Thousands in Move Toward Decriminalizing Marijuana

“Although Police Officer Defendants were holding Randall’s mother, grandmother, aunt, and sisters in a room just feet from where 16-year-old Randall lay—without any cause to do so—Police Officer Defendants never told his family that they had shot the child or that he was bleeding out in the hallway outside his bedroom door. As a result, Randall’s family, including Plaintiff, had no opportunity to render Randall aid, take him to a hospital, or call an ambulance; they also had no opportunity to say goodbye to their son, grandson, nephew, and brother,” the lawsuit read.

After shooting him, officers allegedly offered no aid, instead stepping over him to clear the rest of the home. The police didn’t try to disarm him, and instead just dressed his wounds for 40 minutes after the home had been cleared, the suit says. The family lived just eight minutes away from a hospital, but officers didn’t call for medical services for at least 40 minutes.

Attorneys for the Adjessom family, Grant & Eisenhofer, say the teen’s shooting is part of a “systemic pattern of [the Mobile Police Department] using excessive force against citizens of color; in particular, young Black boys and men.”

The attorneys cite the MPD Police Chief Paul Prine of telling officers “I’m not concerned with what the media and public thinks about the police. F**k the public,” upon being named chief in 2021. Prine was fired earlier this year following complaints from the city, according to WPMI-TV. Prine is suing Mobile, alleging he was fired in retaliation for complaining about the Mobile chief of staff.

Image by Shutterstock

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