Free Republic

The cop who saved lives by taking down an Islamist terrorist almost 10 years ago still can't be identified for legal reasons, and could go to prison if he speaks out about what happened. On December 15-16 2014, Man Horon Monis held 18 hostages in the Lindt Cafe on Martin Place in Sydney in a 16-hour standoff with police. Monis was armed with a pump shotgun, which he used to kill cafe manager Tori Johnson, and said he had a bomb in his backpack. The man who can only be referred to as Officer A, was part of the Tactical...

Democratic Manhattan District Alvin Bragg’s office defended on Wednesday keeping former President Donald Trump under his gag order, requesting that it stay in place at least through Trump’s sentencing hearing in late July and any post-trial motions. Trump attorney’s asked Judge Juan Merchan on Tuesday to lift the order, writing in a letter that the “concerns articulated by the government and the Court do not justify restrictions on the First Amendment rights of President Trump” now that the trial has concluded. Prosecutors disagreed, responding that the order was intended to protect more than just the trial proceedings. “As the People...

Lawyers for former President Donald Trump on Tuesday asked a New York judge to lift the gag order imposed on him in the criminal hush money case, citing his opponent, President Joe Biden‘s 2024 election campaign gloating over his guilty verdict. Trump has been under a gag order since April that bars him from making comments about the jury that presided over the weekslong trial as well as specific witnesses in the case, family members of prosecutors, and the daughter of presiding Judge Juan Merchan. His defense lawyers pointed to specific moments last week in which the Biden campaign used...

Judge Aileen Cannon on Sunday responded to Jack Smith’s second request for a gag order against President Trump. Cannon ordered Trump to respond to Jack Smith’s second motion seeking a gag order by June 14. Jack Smith has to reply to Trump by June 21. In another blow to Jack Smith, Judge Cannon won’t likely rule on his second gag order until late June.

United States District Judge Aileen Cannon recently rejected special counsel Jack Smith's request to place a gag order against former President Donald Trump. On Friday, Smith's team asked Cannon to modify Trump's conditions of release to prohibit him from making "statements that pose a significant, imminent, and foreseeable danger to law enforcement agents participating in the investigation and prosecution of" the classified documents case against Trump. Smith's team claimed the gag order was "necessary because of several intentionally false and inflammatory statements recently made by Trump that distort the circumstances under which the Federal Bureau of Investigation planned and executed...

Judge Cannon just denied Jack Smith's gag order. She slaps him a bit for full effect.

President Trump on Saturday taunted Jack Smith after the special counsel asked Judge Cannon to ban the former president from criticizing law enforcement over the DOJ’s deadly force authorization for the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid. Jack Smith late Friday night sought a gag order barring Trump from criticizing Biden’s rogue DOJ/FBI. The names of the armed FBI agents involved in the Mar-a-Lago raid were redacted but Jack Smith is trying to illegally gag Trump anyway. “The Government moves to modify defendant Donald J. Trump’s conditions of release, to make clear that he may not make statements that pose a significant, imminent,...

Well, there you have it. Jack Smith has joined the “Gag Academy” and requested yet another gag order against President Trump for merely speaking the truth. This post President Trump made on Truth Social was the final straw for little Jack Smith. The gag order is dripping with irony. Smith claims that President Trump is posing a “danger” to law enforcement agents, yet the directive from Biden’s regime that they use “deadly force” is supposedly a nothing burger.The gag order is dripping with irony. Smith claims that President Trump is posing a “danger” to law enforcement agents, yet the directive...

Judge Juan Merchan gagged President Trump and his lawyers, but doesn’t gag Micheal Cohen or the prosecution. Merchan doesn’t care that the prosecution hasn’t actually shown a crime that segues to a supposed bookkeeping violation. The judge won’t allow an expert defense witness who would testify that there was clearly no campaign finance violation that would allow the prosecution to go back to the supposed hush money expenses. The judge doesn’t care that state courts have no jurisdiction over federal election laws. The judge doesn’t care how much Cohen lies on the stand. He doesn’t even care that Cohen is...

After Michael Cohen's disastrous testimony, it would seem that the case against President Trump over the bookkeeping entry in a hush-money payment case would be in tatters as it goes to the jury. Many legal eagles have said as much. But the politically partisan New York justice in this case, Juan Merchan, doesn't give up that fast and clearly wants to salvage the case. He's instructing the jury to ignore the detail about the 'underlying crime' and treat the case the same way a burglary case is treated. According to Newsweek:A hush-money payment is not illegal, and under New York...

Judge Juan Merchan has ordered President Trump to remain silent as the media and Democrats spin lie after lie against his record and character. This is how free societies die. Just as shocking as the Democrat party’s lawlessness is the Republican party’s total avoidance to confront these vicious political acts. We all know this lawlessness cannot continue yet Republicans remain too weak to raise their voices with the rare exception the courageous few who are shunned by their own party elites. On Thursday the media continued their toxic reports on Trump and porn star Stormy Daniels, a opportunist who owes...

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump It is a really bad feeling to have your Constitutional Right to Free Speech, such a big part of life in our Country, so unfairly taken from you, especially when all of the sleazebags, lowlifes, and grifters that you oppose are allowed to say absolutely anything that they want. It is hard to sit back and listen to lies and false statements be made against you knowing that if you respond, even in the most modest fashion, you are told by a Corrupt and Highly Conflicted Judge that you will be PUT IN PRISON, maybe for...

President Trump on Tuesday walked out of the New York City courtroom to talk to the press after Stormy Daniels testified in Alvin Bragg’s ‘hush money’ trial. Stormy testified to irrelevant yet very salacious details about her sexual encounter with Trump that allegedly happened many years ago. She was also reportedly making scripted jokes in the courtroom to win over the jury but nobody was laughing. Trump walked out of the court and spoke to the media. He used a clever trick to avoid violating Judge Merchan’s illegal gag order. Crooked Judge Merchan on Monday held Trump in contempt, fined...

Donald Trump would likely be sent to New York City's largest jail, Rikers Island, if he is jailed for breaching another gag order, according to a legal expert.But Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor at West Coast Trial Lawyers, exclusively told Daily Express US that Trump being sent to jail would likely cause “mass protests and civil unrest.”

Donald Trump is now daring the judge in his Manhattan trial to throw him in jail for violating his gag order.Leaving court on Monday in week four of his trial, Trump told the gaggle of reporters staged near the courtroom how deeply unfair, outrageous, and unconstitutional the gag order is. I have to watch every word I tell you people. You ask me a question and I can't talk about it because this judge has given me a gag order and said you'll go to jail if I violate it. And frankly, you know what? Our constitution is much more...

WHEN THE JUDGE GAGS A KEY WITNESS FOR TRUMP’S DEFENSE. The false bookkeeping trial of former President Donald Trump is now in its fourth week. This newsletter has pointed out lots of times, most recently last Friday, that while we know that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has charged Trump with falsifying bookkeeping records of a nondisclosure payment in order to commit or conceal another crime, Bragg still hasn’t revealed what that other crime is. It’s really the key to the whole case. Without the other crime, there would be no charges against Trump in this matter. The fact that...

NEW YORK — The judge presiding over Donald Trump’s hush money trial has fined him $1,000 for violating his gag order and sternly warned the former president that additional violation could result in jail time. The fine marks the second sanction for Trump for inflammatory comments about witnesses since the start of the trial last month. He was fined $9,000 last week for nine violations. Judge Juan M. Merchan warned Monday that additional gag order violations could potentially result in jail time, though he said that was “the last thing I want to do.” Prosecutors in Trump’s hush money trial...

I was watching today's Rallies in Wisconsin and Michigan. Trump, again, spoke out about the unfairness of the Manhattan Trial, "the conflicted judge," the corrupt prosecutor etc. In short, he's not shutting up, which begs the question. Is he calling the judge's bluff? Is he trying to get incarcerated? Why would he do that? What would be the scenario if the judge tells the bailiff to handcuff Trump and take him to jail for contempt of court? Would he agree to be handcuffed? I don't think he'd want that photo-op, but what can happen? Would the Secret Service sit back...

The nine posts that the judge in Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s falsified business records case ordered Trump to take down on Tuesday have been deleted. Judge Juan Merchan ruled on Tuesday morning ahead of the second week of the trial that Trump needed to pay $9,000, $1,000 for each gag order violation. An additional hearing on more alleged gag order violations will take place on Thursday. The order reads that the defendant, Trump, "is hereby warned that the Court will not tolerate continued willful violations of its lawful orders and that if necessary and appropriate under the circumstances, it will...

Former President Trump deleted social media posts that a judge determined violated a gag order in his criminal hush money trial, just before a Tuesday deadline. Judge Juan Merchan fined Trump $9,000 and held him in contempt nine times early Tuesday over the posts on Truth Social and his campaign website, which included attacks on prospective jurors and witnesses in the case. He added that further violations could result in jail time. “Defendant is hereby warned that the Court will not tolerate continued willful violations of its lawful orders and that if necessary and appropriate under the circumstances, it will...