Indicted attorney John Eastman wants his trial in Fulton County, Georgia on RICO conspiracy charges cleaved from the trial of his co-defendant, former President Donald Trump. Eastman, who was one of 19 co-defendants originally indicted in the case, wants Judge McAfee to break up the remaining defendants into two groups — each to be tried separately from Trump. Or, as Eastman’s attorney Wilmer Parker III puts it “absent former President Trump.”
Eastman asserts that breaking the groups in two will increase the speediness of the trial(s), while asserting too that separating Trump’s case will speed the wheels of justice — since “without Defendant Trump in the courtroom the U.S. Secret Service will not be involved in providing enhanced security, and the trials will proceed faster.”
Interesting: John Eastman asking Judge McAfee to split the remaining Fulton defendants into two groups so that defendants not named Trump can get their case resolved earlier in 2024 pic.twitter.com/aiAJHPa57Q
— Tamar Hallerman (@TamarHallerman) November 27, 2023
Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance believes the separation of the trials, ostensibly in the interest of speed, is actually an attempt to further slow the prosecution of the remaining defendants — or at least the most famous one.
“Although [Eastman] doesn’t come out and say it,” Vance writes, “what he’s asking for is two separate trials for all remaining defendants, but not including Trump.” That leaves a third trial for the former President, which would occur after the first two.
Vance describes the request as “a device to get to the desired result: delaying Trump’s trial until after the election.” Since legally, Vance says, there is “no rationale” for splitting up the defendants, Vance concludes that Eastman’s request is “a cute stunt, but not much more than that.”
Eastman is still, in Vance’s view, betting on Trump to help him and as a down payment he is working to further Trump’s desired goal, a forestalling of his trial until after the election. Vance doesn’t think the move has legs and says “nor is the Judge likely to have any illusion about what this is or indulge Eastman.”
