Former US President Donald Trump found guilty in a historic trial in New York, United States, the BBC reports. The former president was found guilty on all 34 counts for which he had been charged.
“The panel of 12 Manhattan jurors reached their unanimous verdict on Thursday after two weeks of deliberations and a six-week trial. The court heard from more than 20 witnesses, including Stormy Daniels, whose alleged sexual encounter with the former president was at the centre of the case,” the BBC reported.
Following the guilty verdict, the former president will now be sentenced on July 11. This will be just days before the Republican National Convention, during which he is expected to be named as the Republican candidate in the on-coming presidential elections in November this year.
“While he could in theory face prison, a financial penalty is seen as the more likely punishment following Thursday’s unanimous verdict,” the BBC reported.
After the sentencing, the former president who is 77 years old termed the verdict as a disgrace. He said that he would fight it to the end.
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“This was a disgrace. This was a rigged trial by a conflicted judge who was corrupt as a rigged trial and disgrace. It wouldn’t give us a venue change,” Trump said. “We were at five percent or 6 per cent in this district, in this area. This was a rigged, disgraceful trial… The real verdict is going to be November 5th by the people.”
According to a related report by Fox News, “prosecutors [in the case] needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump falsified those records to conceal a $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, a pornographic performer, in the lead-up to the 2016 election to silence her about an alleged affair with Trump in 2006.”
Reacting to the news, current President Joe Biden’s campaign hailed the verdict. However, the BBC quoted US House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson as terming the verdict as a “shameful day in American history” and symbolic of the “weaponisation” of the justice system to “silence dissent”.