A federal judge in South Florida officially dismissed former President Donald Trump‘s lawsuit regarding the FBI’s seizure of his Mar-a-Lago records.
The decision comes after an appeals court ruled earlier this month that she lacked jurisdiction in the case, NY Post reported Monday. It marks the end of a months-long case following the review of records.
South Florida judge dismissed Trump’s lawsuit over FBI’s seizure of Mar-a-Lago docs
In a one-page order lodged Monday, US District Judge Aileen Cannon instructed the case closed. Eleven days earlier, a three-judge appeals committee decided Cannon had failed in ordering Brooklyn federal judge Raymond Dearie to examine papers obtained from the Palm Beach residence on Aug. 8 to evaluate if they were protected by an executive, attorney-client, or any other special rights.
Cannon’s Sept. 5 ruling assigning Dearie as special master slowed the progress of the investigation on whether Trump, 76, violated federal rules regarding the keeping of sensitive information by relocating official papers and other materials to Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House in January 2021.
As part of her ruling, Cannon directed the DOJ to refrain from using the recovered materials in its probe of Trump till Dearie completed his assessment. Cannon’s decision, however, was deemed a “needless judicial intrusion” into the case by the appeals court judges.
Judge states that creating a ‘special exception’ for Trump would be unfair
“It is indeed extraordinary for a warrant to be executed at the home of a former president — but not in a way that affects our legal analysis or otherwise gives the judiciary license to interfere in an ongoing investigation,” the panel said.
The judges also stated that forming a “special exception” for the former president “would defy our Nation’s foundational principle that our law applies ‘to all, without regard to numbers, wealth, or rank.’”
Trump’s legal team, who chose not to contest the verdict to the Supreme Court, claims that over 900 documents collected by the FBI are either private records or confidential information. The legal counsel added that these documents should be kept separate from the subject of the DOJ’s inquiry.
Attorney General Merrick Garland assigned special counsel Jack Smith to lead the probe on November 18. Over 100 of the documents were labelled as “confidential,” “secret,” or “top secret.”
