Michael Cohen is supposed to begin his jail sentence a month from tomorrow, but his attorneys are hoping a new document discovery helps delay or even reduce his time behind bars. Cohen’s legal team laid out their case in a 12-page memo to Democratic leaders in Congress saying, “It is a fact that Mr. Cohen remains the only member of the Trump Organization, including Mr. Trump himself, who has been prosecuted and who is going to prison for conduct almost all of which was for the benefit of Mr. Trump personally and indeed directed by him. In our opinion, there is something unjust here.”
Highlighting evidence he provided to congressional committees in February, a letter that accompanied the memo states that Cohen “was only recently able to access a hard drive with important documents,” and that the “drive contains over 14 million files, which consist of all e-mails, voice recordings, images, and attachments from Mr. Cohen’s computers and phones.” Lanny Davis, one of Cohen’s attorneys, told BuzzFeed News that Cohen had no access to the hard drive when he testified before Congress earlier this year because it had been seized by prosecutors and was returned to him only last week.
The letter continues: “We are writing this letter in the hope that you will support Mr. Cohen’s value as a cooperating witness and the need for him to be readily accessible.”
It is our hope that the authorities in the Southern District of New York will consider this total picture of cooperation by Mr. Cohen, verified by your letter and the important new evidence he has made available or could make available to assist the government, and the particular facts involved here to grant Mr. Cohen a reduced term following the rules and procedures of the Southern District of New York. It is also our hope, again expressed with all respect, that the Southern District of New York recognizes the need for Mr. Cohen to be readily available to Congress and to prosecutors conducting these investigations, such that his date to report for incarceration about four weeks from now will be substantially postponed while he is fully cooperating with prosecutors and Congress.
