Judge Juan Merchan Donald Trump's legal team and prosecutors on Friday that there was an explosive comment about the ex-president's jury posted online, but that comment looks increasingly likely to be a hoax, according to a report.
The judge overseeing the criminal case in which Trump was convicted of 34 felonies for an attempt to cover-up hush money payments meant to influence the 2016 election let the parties know that a comment claiming to be from a juror's cousin was posted on the court's Facebook page around the time Trump was found guilty of all charges in the case involving an alleged affair with an adult film star.
It was almost immediately a blockbuster story on social media, with experts debating the importance of the development in the Trump case. One MSNBC legal expert the comment was "unbelievably bad."
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Kyle Cheney, senior legal affairs reporter for Politico, said, "It looks increasingly likely to be a hoax/troll, but Justice Merchan nevertheless informed Trump/Bragg about a Facebook poster who claimed to have insight into Trump jury deliberations while they were ongoing."
Cheney linked to a Politico article, which says that "Merchan, who presided over Trump’s recently concluded hush money trial, did not indicate whether the post — which is no longer visible on Facebook — appeared legitimate or may have been the result of a prank."
"Media efforts to locate the poster indicated that the post likely came from an account associated with someone who appears to be a regular troll of the New York court system’s social media pages," according to the piece. "It’s unclear whether the user’s comment was posted on May 29 or sometime soon after. It’s also unclear whether court officials have done any work to substantiate the post or whether Merchan simply disclosed it out of an abundance of caution."
