(AFP) – A federal judge on Monday blocked the release of a report by former special counsel Jack Smith about US President Donald Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified government documents. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, dismissed the documents case against Trump in July 2024, ruling that Smith was unlawfully appointed. The Justice Department appealed Cannon’s ruling but dropped the case after Trump won the November 2024 presidential election.
Trump was also accused of plotting to overturn the results of the 2020 election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. That case was also dropped by Smith in line with a Justice Department policy of not prosecuting a sitting president. Cannon on Monday granted a motion filed by Trump and two co-defendants seeking to block the public release of Smith’s investigative report into the classified documents case.
She said it would be unfair to release evidence gathered by prosecutors in a case where there had been no finding of guilt. “Disclosure of non-public discovery material… would contravene basic notions of fairness and justice,” Cannon wrote. “The former defendants in this case, like any other defendant in this situation, still enjoy the presumption of innocence.”
“The Court strains to find a situation in which a former special counsel has released a report after initiating criminal charges that did not result in a finding of guilt,” she said. Trump was accused by Smith of stashing classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida after leaving the White House in January 2021 and obstructing efforts to have them returned. He denied the allegations.
© 2024 AFP
