NEW YORK (AP) — Conservative strategist Steve Bannon gained’t face trial till February on state fees of conspiring to dupe donors to construct a border wall, a choose mentioned Monday as prosecutors requested for the jury to be nameless.
Bannon was not in court docket however listened in just about as Decide April Newbauer set Feb. 25 for jury choice, suspending it from subsequent month. Bannon didn’t communicate besides to say, “yes, ma’am” when requested whether or not he understood he should be in court docket on the brand new date.
Bannon, a longtime ally and onetime White Home adviser to former and future President Donald Trump, was just lately launched from a four-month federal jail stint in a contempt of Congress case.
His trial within the case surrounding the onetime charity often called WeBuildTheWall Inc. had been set to start out Dec. 9. Bannon chaired the group’s advisory board.
The choose delayed the trial date after deciding to let the long run jurors hear proof that a number of the wall charity’s cash went to pay a greater than $600,000 bank card debt {that a} separate Bannon not-for-profit group had racked up in 2019. Prosecutors needed to introduce it, however protection legal professionals argued unsuccessfully that it was irrelevant.
Bannon has pleaded not responsible to fees together with conspiracy and cash laundering within the case. Manhattan prosecutors introduced it after Trump pardoned Bannon in the same federal prosecution that was in its early levels.
The choose has but to rule on whether or not jurors’ names might be stored confidential.