(CN) — A federal judge in the classified documents case against Donald Trump allowed the former president’s employee and co-defendant to keep his lawyer despite potential conflicts of interest.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon, a Trump appointee, ended a lengthy legal battle that shined a light on a complex web of attorney-client relations that formed amid an investigation into the former president’s mishandling of classified documents at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
Defense attorney Stanley Woodward Jr. represented at least seven witnesses before he was paid by Trump’s political action committee to defend the former president’s aide, Walt Nauta, on charges he helped his boss hide boxes of classified documents from federal investigators.
Among Woodward’s former clients was an IT specialist at Mar-a-Lago who became a key government witness after accusing another Mar-a-Lago employee, Carlos De Oliveira, of pressuring him to delete incriminating security footage before it could be turned over to a federal grand jury.
A superseding indictment filed in July charged all three men with new obstruction-related offenses based on the unidentified cooperator’s statements.
Prosecutors filed a motion in August requesting a Garcia hearing to probe Woodward’s potential conflicts of interest and determine if Nauta would waive the issue.
Similar concerns were raised about De Oliveira’s attorney, John Irving, who has represented three potential witnesses in the case. At a hearing last week, Cannon explained Irving’s potential conflicts of interest to De Oliveira, who confirmed he still wanted the lawyer to represent him at trial in May.
Irving told Cannon his co-counsel would cross-examine his former clients if they testify at trial.
Nauta was expected to waive his concerns, too, but Cannon delayed the hearing after prosecutors raised unexpected arguments.
Last week, Woodward denied his loyalties to other clients would interfere with his ability to defend Nauta, but he relented after the judge ordered the parties to discuss the issue earlier this week.
At a hearing Friday, Woodward agreed his co-counsel would cross-examine the IT specialist and a second potential witness if they are called to testify at trial.
Cannon explained to Nauta what issues could arise at trial if Woodward remained on the case, and the defendant chose to keep him, according to court filings.
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