Donald Trump’s legal drama features a colorful cast of characters

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The historic indictment of Donald Trump is the culmination of a four-year investigation marked by unexpected twists and unusual characters. Here is a list of some of the major players:

Stormy Daniels

Stormy Daniels: Trump denies any contact © Ethan Miller/Getty Images

The woman at the center of the story. Daniels, 44, is an adult movie star. (Her birth name is Stephanie Gregory). She claims she met Trump in 2006 at a charity golf tournament in Lake Tahoe, California. As she said, Trump invited her to his suite. What ensued was “probably the least amazing sex I’ve ever had,” Daniels said, claiming that Trump offered her a role on his reality television show, The Apprentice. (Trump denies any liaison, and now calls Daniels “horse face”). Daniels tried to sell her story in 2016, when the former reality television star was on her way to the White House.

David Pecker

David Pecker: longtime Trump friend and Palm Beach denizen © Marion Curtis/AP

The one-time king of America’s supermarket tabloids and publisher of the National Enquirer is a longtime Trump friend and Palm Beach native. When Trump entered politics, Pecker, 71, offered to look into potentially damaging stories, according to prosecutors. In a tabloid dark art known as “catch-and-kill”, he could buy them but never publish them. When Daniels’ team approached the Enquirer to sell his story in 2016, Pecker redirected them to Trump’s then-fixer, Michael Cohen, to broker a deal.

Michael Cohen

Michael Cohen: fixer who was fascinated by Trump © Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images

Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer was once so loyal to his boss that he promised to “take a bullet” for him, if necessary. By his own account, ‘Mini-Me’ Cohen, 56, was fascinated by Trump when he worked for him, even buying several apartments in his buildings. The Trumps appear to view Cohen, who was involved in the taxi medallion trade, as little more than a slave.

Cohen arranged to pay Daniels $130,000 for his story. He did it, he said, on Trump’s orders. He pleaded guilty in 2018 to tax fraud and campaign finance violations related to the pay-off, and was sentenced to three years in prison. Since breaking up with Trump, she has been reborn as his ardent antagonist. Cohen testified before the grand jury but his value as a government witness could be undermined by his perjury record. He lied to Congress, for example, about the Trumps’ now famous Moscow tower project.

Allen Weisselberg

Allen Weisselberg: decades of loyalty to the Trumps © Michael M Santiago/Getty Images

The former longtime chief financial officer of the Trump Organization was hired by Donald’s father, Fred Trump. More than anyone, Weisselberg, 75, knew the family business and thus became the holy grail for prosecutors. They were unable to flip him, despite winning a guilty plea on tax charges that landed Weisselberg in Rikers Island prison for a five-month sentence. He will be released in late April.

Prosecutors are still pressing Weisselberg on a separate front: Trump’s alleged practice of inflating the value of his properties to win favorable loan and insurance arrangements. They hope the threat of new criminal charges could prompt Weisselberg to break his decades-long loyalty to the Trumps.

Cyrus Vance, Jr

Cyrus Vance, Jr: Trump investigation launched in 2018 © Michael M Santiago/Getty Images

The man who succeeded the legendary Robert Morgenthau as Manhattan district attorney and launched the Trump investigation in 2018. Vance, 68, the son of a Democratic Party mandarin, was motivated by Cohen’s testimony to Congress about the “hush” paying money to Daniels. His investigation then expanded into the business practices of the Trump Organization.

Vance’s office has been frustrated at every turn by Trump’s legal team’s epic delay tactics, which required a Supreme Court battle to force the president’s accountant to comply with a subpoena for his tax records. His lead prosecutors, veteran New York lawyers Mark Pomerantz and Carey Dunne, thought the “hush” money case was weak but they had a stronger case against Trump related to his inflation. of assets. They failed to carry it before Vance’s third and final term expires in January 2022.

Alvin Bragg

Alvin Bragg: first prosecutor in US history to indict a former or sitting president © Alex Kent/AFP/Getty Images

The son of both working-class Harlem and Harvard Law School took over from Vance a little over a year ago and thus inherited the office’s most incendiary case. Black and progressive, Bragg, 49, has become a punching bag for the right for ordering his staff to refrain from prosecuting many nonviolent offenses while, at the same time, going after Trump for alleged payment of a housewife. Bragg was intelligent and well liked by his peers. But even admirers wonder if he has the political gifts to justify such a consequential case to a skeptical public.

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