A federal judge has ordered ex-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen released from prison by Friday, ruling his return to lockup was retaliation. Cohen had refused to agree not to publish a book about the president while under house arrest.
Cohen was returned to prison earlier this month, after being furloughed in May amid concerns over the Covid-19 outbreak. Judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled on Thursday that the decision was “retaliatory.” The day before he was sent back to prison, Cohen refused to agree to not publish a book about President Donald Trump while serving the remainder of his three-year sentence at home, the judge explained in his decision ordering the lawyer released.
“I’ve never seen such a clause, in 21 years in being a judge,” Hellerstein declared during the hearing. “How can I take any other inference but that it was retaliatory?”
While the former presidential fixer was photographed eating at a Manhattan restaurant while under “house arrest,” the American Civil Liberties Union and law firm Perry Guha LLP filed a lawsuit arguing Cohen that was actually being re-imprisoned because he planned to publish a book, calling his incarceration “a brazen assault on the First Amendment.”
While furloughed, Cohen tweeted that he was “close to completion” of a tell-all book about his relationship with Trump, teasing a September publication date. According to the lawsuit, he was presented with a choice: agree not to speak to the media in any form, including via book publication, or stay in jail. Cohen is currently locked up at Otisville Federal Correctional Institution.
