Judge dismisses Trump’s lawsuit for expert witness in Mar-a-Lago case

(CNN) — An independent expert’s review of evidence seized at Mar-a-Lago, the home of former President Donald Trump, will not proceed.

On Monday, Judge Eileen Cannon formally dismissed the case, in which Trump sought to challenge the seizure of evidence at Mar-a-Lago, in which he appointed another judge, independent expert Raymond Deary, to make recommendations about whether lawyers could have access. Evidence.

The decision to dismiss the case now gives the Justice Department full access to thousands of records and other artifacts found in classified documents from the beach club and Trump’s personal office.

Cannon’s move comes after the High Court of Appeals ruled that a judge does not have the authority to intervene in a criminal investigation before charges are filed. The court told Cannon that the case should be dismissed and that there would be no proceedings before him in the Southern District of Florida.

The new order was a rare silver lining for Trump as he tries to fend off mounting investigations into his conduct.

In the same judicial district as Mar-a-Lago, Ft. Pierce, Fla. Cannon — a Trump appointee to a federal court in , — has drawn criticism from across the ideological spectrum for his handling of the case filed in the Trump days. After an FBI raid on his private home.

That criticism culminated in a scathing opinion by an appeals court panel, packed with GOP candidates, that tore apart Trump and Cannon’s reasoning for why an independent expert was needed.

For the review, Cannon assigned Deary, a Brooklyn judge, to resolve disputes between Trump and the Justice Department over whether certain documents obtained in the search should be withheld from federal investigators.

Although Deary was tasked with making recommendations on those issues, Cannon was to be the final arbiter of those disputes until the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled that the appointment of an independent expert was not warranted.

The review could delay the judicial process because the canon prevented judicial investigators from using seized documents in their criminal investigations while the special expertise process was underway. The department is evaluating whether three criminal statutes were violated in the manner in which critical government documents from the Trump White House were brought and stored at Mar-a-Lago.

In an earlier case, the Justice Department obtained an exception from the 11th Circuit that allowed authorities to use classified documents seized in searches in their investigation.

And while large parts of the investigation were on hold, there were other signs that the investigation was moving forward. The federal grand jury overseeing the investigation heard testimony from Trump advisers in recent weeks.

The investigation is now in hand Special Counsel Jack SmithHe underlined his desire not to slow down.

However, prosecutors cautioned that the review precludes their ability to question witnesses about how some documents were handled and mixed with Trump’s personal effects at his home.

Trump has argued that some of the documents obtained by the FBI are attorney-client privilege, executive privilege or personal in nature, putting them outside the scope of a criminal investigation.

While the independent expert’s order had the effect of blocking aspects of the department’s investigation, it led to unprecedented insight into the documents’ investigation, even for Trump’s legal team, as the Justice Department argued in court that a third-party review was not required. .