Federal prosecutors have added more charges against former president Donald Trump for allegedly obstructing the investigation into whether he unlawfully retained national defence information at his Palm Beach, Florida property.
In a superceding indictment filed late Thursday, prosecutors alleged that Mr Trump and co-defendant Walt Nauta conspired with another Mar-a-Lago worker, Carlos De Oliveira, to attempt to have surveillance footage from the club deleted so it could not be provided to the grand jury investigating the presence of classified documents at his property.
Mr Trump was also newly charged with specifically posessing the classified document which he is alleged to have shown to a group of people at his Bedminster, New Jersey club.
In a statement, Mr Trump’s presidential campaign called the new charges “nothing more than a continued desperate and flailing attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their Department of Justice to harass President Trump and those around him”.
“Deranged Jack Smith knows that they have no case and is casting about for any way to salvage their illegal witch hunt and to get someone other than Donald Trump to run against Crooked Joe Biden,” the campaign said.
According to the indictment, Mr Trump allegedly called Mr De Oliveira on 23 June of last year, one day after prosecutors emailed his company a draft grand jury subpoena calling for production of CCTV camera footage from the club, including locations where boxes containing classified documents were stored.
It’s not known exactly what Mr Trump said to his new co-defendant during the 24 minute phone call, but prosecutors allege that at some point Mr Trump ordered the deletion of security camera footage so it could not be used to further the probe into his possession of documents with classification markings after the end of his presidency.
The next day, prosecutors served the Trump Organisation with the final version of the subpoena, and Mr Trump is alleged to have met with Mr Nauta, who subsequently cancelled plans to travel with Mr Trump and instead arranged travel to Palm Beach.
After the former US Navy Chief Petty Officer changed his plans, prosecutors allege that he lied to fellow employees and Secret Service agents about the purpose of his travel.
At the same time, he contacted another Mar-a-Lago employee who served as director of information technology at the club, as well as another Mar-a-Lago worker, and disclosed to the latter that his purpose in visiting the club was to discuss how long CCTV footage was stored.
Prosecutors also allege that Mr Nauta and Mr De Oliveira actually walked through the darkened club after Mr Nauta arrived there on 25 June, with flashlights to determine where different security cameras were located.
Mr De Oliveira, who has also been charged with conspiracy and obstruction of justice, subsequently the aforementioned Mar-a-Lago employee that “the boss” wanted the footage deleted before it could be provided to the grand jury investigating the presence of classified documents at the club.
The longtime Mar-a-Lago worker is also charged with lying to FBI agents about his role in assisting in the moving of boxes containing classified documents at different points during the investigation.
Additionally, Mr Nauta has now been charged with conspiring with Mr De Oliveira to obstruct justice by participating in efforts to have the surveillance at issue deleted, and Mr Trump has been hit with another count of obstruction of justice for asking for the footage to be deleted.
Mr De Oliveira has been summoned to make his first court appearance in the case on 31 July at the same Miami courthouse where Mr Trump and Mr Nauta were arraigned.
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