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Donald Trump pounded the table and looked "furious" before storming out of his New York fraud trial on Wednesday, Michael Cohen's attorney has said.
Danya Perry was in court for Trump's outburst, which was in response to Judge Arthur Engoron's refusal to dismiss all the claims against the former president.
"[Engoron] swiftly denied the motion. Trump pounded the table and he just stormed out and his team and all the secret service were required to scramble and chase after him. He was red in the face, he was furious."
"He said something I couldn't quite capture like 'This is ridiculous' or 'this is a lie' or something and went out and gave a little impromptu press conference about how he had just won the case and then left," Perry said.
She was speaking to her legal colleague, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, on the video podcast Legal AF that Friedman Agnifilo hosts on the Meidastouch liberal news website.
Cohen, Trump's former attorney, admitted under cross-examination on Wednesday that he did not recall if Trump had asked him to inflate the values of his assets on financial records—the central allegation of the lawsuit against Trump and the Trump organization by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Trump denies any wrongdoing.
Perry recalled that as soon as Cohen made the admission, Cliff Robert, an attorney for the Trump family, asked Engoron to dismiss the case based on Cohen's answer. The judge denied the request and Trump got up and stormed out. Trump later re-entered the court after speaking to the media. Robert again asked for a directed verdict dismissing the case and was refused.
Perry joked that Robert was hoping to be like Reese Witherspoon's character, Elle Woods, in the Legally Blonde series, and get a case thrown based on a single cross-examination question.
"[Robert] wanted an Elle Woods moment where the whole courtroom erupts and the case is dismissed. It doesn't happen that way in the real world, it's play acting," she said.
The New York Times and other media outlets have commented on how Cohen did not look comfortable in the witness stand and struggled to answer some questions.
Perry had harsh words for the New York Attorney General's Office, which she said had not met with Cohen before his testimony. She said she always prepared her clients before a case.
"It was shocking, absolutely shocking to me.
"It was very uncomfortable for him and apparently they [the attorney general's lawyers] didn't want to object a lot," she said.
Perry said that she had prepared Cohen for the case but he hadn't seen some of the documents since 2013.
She said that she could not object on his behalf and couldn't rely on the attorney general's lawyers to object, but Cohen, as Trump's former attorney, did a good job of "self-objecting" to questions that related to client-attorney privilege.
Perry said Cohen has been subjected to a lot of "drama and vitriol" for testifying against Trump. "We've had security around us because there have been real threats to him," she said.
Friedman Agnifilo introduced Perry on her show as "my colleague, whom I work with now."
While a summary judgement has already found Trump liable for committing fraud in New York, the trial is continuing on six other claims in the lawsuit and to decide whether Trump pays a penalty.
Cohen, who in 2018 pleaded guilty to tax evasion and campaign finance violations that occurred while he was employed by Trump, told reporters after testifying on Wednesday that he made direct eye contact with the former president "several times" during his testimony. He suggested that Trump looked like he had resigned himself to the trial marking "the end of The Trump Organization."
Newsweek has sought email comment from the legal team representing Trump, who is the frontrunner to take the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential election.
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About the writer
Sean O'Driscoll is a Newsweek Senior Crime and Courts Reporter based in Ireland. His focus is reporting on U.S. law. ... Read more