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A key witness against former President Donald Trump and his two co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira, in the case of classified documents found at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence recanted previous false testimony and provided new information implicating the defendants, after changing attorneys, according to a new court document filed Tuesday by the office of special counsel Jack Smith, Politico reported.
Yuscil Taveras, director of information technology at Mar-a-Lago, changed his testimony about attempts to erase security camera footage at Trump’s club in Florida in July after switching from a lawyer paid for by Trump’s Save America PAC to a public defender, according to the legal document.
Taveras’ revised testimony led to last month’s superseding indictment against Trump and his two co-defendants.
Taveras initially testified before a grand jury in Washington, DC, which was unaware of any efforts to delete the videos, but after he named his new attorney “immediately? he recanted the previous false testimony of him” and detailed the alleged effort to tamper with evidence related to the investigation of the handling of stored classified information at Trump’s home in Florida, according to the new filing.
The filing identifies Taveras as “Trump 4 Employee.”
Why is this revealed now?
Special counsel Jack Smith’s team revealed the details of the employee’s sweeping change as part of a filing required by Florida-based US District Court Judge Aileen Cannon, who is overseeing the classified documents case against the former President Trump, according to NBC News.
Judge Cannon questioned why prosecutors continued to collect evidence from an integrated grand jury in Washington, DC, even after Smith obtained a grand jury indictment in Florida in June charging Trump with more than 30 counts of withholding classified documents. at his Mar-a-Lago property. .
Trump and his longtime aides, Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira, are also charged in the case with taking steps to obstruct investigators seeking to recover government documents.
Taveras’ reversal led directly to new charges against Trump that Smith’s prosecutors included in a superseding indictment issued by a federal grand jury in Miami last month, which details alleged efforts to erase security camera recordingsthe prosecutors said.
Walter Nauta had been charged in the initial indictment, but de Oliveira was added as a defendant only in the revised indictment.
In an apparent attempt to assuage any ongoing concerns from Cannon about a grand jury hundreds of miles away working on matters related to the case she is handling, Smith’s team informed him that the DC grand jury officially completed its work on August 17.
Cannon’s request for an explanation of the DC federal court action came as prosecutors expressed concern about a conflict of interest between Nauta and Taveraswho were represented, for a time, by attorney Stanley Woodward, who has become ubiquitous in cases involving Trump associates.
Woodward represents several defendants and witnesses related to prosecutor Jack Smith’s investigations into Trump’s handling of classified documents and also in the case about his attempt to subvert the 2020 election.
Prosecutors said that Taveras’ change of testimony would put Woodward in an awkward position if he continues to represent Nauta, since Woodward might have to press his former client on why he changed his story.
Keep reading:
– Trump faces 37 federal charges for handling classified documents
– Special counsel charges Trump with new crimes in case of classified documents found in Mar-a-Lago