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Not a lawyer, but actually if you read up a lot of the legal analysis and court documents surrounding the FBI search of Mar a Lago and subsequent appeals by Mr
by jameshart 4y ago
Not a lawyer, but actually if you read up a lot of the legal analysis and court documents surrounding the FBI search of Mar a Lago and subsequent appeals by Mr Trump to request his stuff back and to stymie any investigations.. the list of things Trump’s lawyers were unable to prove or failed to do (enumerated rather effectively in the final appeal court ruling on the Special Master case [1]) lays out basically what legal recourse a person actually does have to object to a search (which is approved by a court, so generally presumptively legal). Which is not much - the FBI is allowed to pursue investigations, and presumably they are still doing that. This was fairly recent. He’s only really going to be in a position to complain about not getting his stuff back if they conclude their investigation without charging him and still don’t hand it back.
But still, the analysis in the Mar a Lago case of the ‘Richey’ factors seems like it maybe could be argued that this guy has some merits to asking for his stuff back in precisely the ways the Trump case lacked (disregard for constitutional rights, with respect to his first amendment speech in particular; pressing need for access to the seized property, as demonstrated by his mention of tax records etc.; lack of a remedy at law, given that he hasn’t been given notice of any pending charges and is missing part of the warrant, etc). So maybe he has a case.
Whether he has the money to make that case is a different matter.
[1] https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23323316-11thcircuit https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23323316-11thcircuit