COURT
BATTLES
Trump mulling motion to appoint ‘special master’
to review evidence from Mar-a-Lago search: attorney
BY JARED
GANS - 08/20/22 2:07 PM ET
Former
President Trump is considering filing a motion for a “special master” to review
the evidence that the FBI obtained during its search at his Mar-a-Lago property
last week.
Trump’s
lead counsel for the matter, James Trusty, told conservative radio talk show
host Mark Levin on his show on Friday that the former president’s legal team
will “very soon” file a motion related to the Fourth Amendment to the
Constitution, which protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures.
Trusty said
appointing a special master, which is an official selected by a judge to carry
out a judicial matter on the court’s behalf, is rare in relation to search
warrants being executed, but there needs to be “somebody in the middle” because
the Justice Department (DOJ) should not be able to be “the guardians of what’s
privileged or not.”
He said one
of the benefits of appointing a special master is stopping the DOJ in
inspecting the documents.
Trump
hinted on his social media platform Truth Social earlier on Friday that he
would take legal action against the search related to the Fourth Amendment,
claiming his rights have been violated.
Trusty said
previous arguments about the disclosure of documents related to the search of
Trump’s property in Palm Beach, Fla., have been related to the First
Amendment’s protection of the freedom of the press, but Trump’s lawyers are
going to work “very hard” in defense of Trump, who he said should not have been
subjected to the search warrant.
He said the
team will argue that the search was overly broad based on the Fourth Amendment
language requiring particularity and narrowness in searches.
Trusty said
the part of the search warrant that allowed FBI agents to take an entire box if
a document marked as classified was found in it, along with other boxes that
are “collectively stored” with the box, is the “functional equivalent” of a
general search with no limit in scope.
He said the
property receipt, which has been made public, is vague and includes
descriptions like “box of documents,” so Trump’s team does not know exactly
what was taken or from where.
Trump’s
potential action would come days after the federal judge who approved the
search warrant said he might be willing to unseal parts of the affidavit that
the FBI used to show its evidence that there was probable cause of a crime
being committed. The judge told the DOJ to suggest redactions to the document,
and he would determine if they were appropriate.
The Fourth
Amendment requires that warrants specifically describe the location to be
searched and items to be seized. The search warrant was unsealed shortly after
the search took place following a DOJ motion for it to be publicized given the
significant public interest in the situation.
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