Michael Cohen arrives back at home after being released from prison due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic, in New York, on May 21, 2020.Brendan McDermid/Reuters
U.S. President Donald Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen was ordered released from prison and will go into home confinement on Friday after a federal judge found he was subjected to retaliation for planning to publish a book about the President ahead of November’s election.
Mr. Cohen, who had been released in May, was sent back to prison on July 9 after questioning a provision in a new series of conditions U.S. probation officers asked him to sign. The provision barred him from publishing the book, engaging with news organizations and posting on social media.
U.S District Judge Alvin Hellerstein ordered Mr. Cohen released from the federal prison in Otisville, New York, about 110 kilometres northwest of New York City to his son by 2 p.m. EDT on Friday.
“I make the finding that the purpose of transferring Mr. Cohen from furlough and home confinement to jail is retaliatory and it’s retaliatory because of his desire to exercise his First Amendment rights to publish a book,” Justice Hellerstein said at Thursday’s hearing.
Justice Hellerstein said he had never seen such a gag order in his 21 years on the bench.
During the hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Allison Rovner said that Mr. Cohen and his attorney had also questioned or objected to other provisions in the agreement, including pre-employment approval and electronic monitoring. She also said probation officer Adam Pakula found Mr. Cohen “combative.”
The judge disagreed.
“It seems to me what Mr. Pakula saying is combative is an attorney’s effort to negotiate an agreement,” Justice Hellerstein said.
Mr. Cohen’s lawyer, Danya Perry, called the order a “victory” for the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech, and said she appreciated the judge’s ruling that the government can’t block Mr. Cohen from publishing a book that is critical of the President as a condition of his release.
“This principle transcends politics, and we are gratified that the rule of law prevails,” she said.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Justice Hellerstein asked the two sides to negotiate the media provision over the next week so that “it is consistent with the First Amendment but yet serves the purposes of confinement.”
For the time being, Mr. Cohen’s lawyer said he would agree to the media gag order so he does not have to wait.
Mr. Cohen, who once said he would “take a bullet” for Trump, was sentenced in 2018 for directing hush payments to pornographic film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, who claimed they had affairs with Mr. Trump. The President has denied having the encounters and has called Mr. Cohen a “rat.”
On July 2, Mr. Cohen tweeted he was close to completing a book and he anticipated publishing it in September. At the time of his release in May, he tweeted that “there is so much I want to say and intend to say. But now is not the right time. Soon.”
Even as he turned on Mr. Cohen, Mr. Trump has repeatedly voiced his support for loyal former allies.
A day after Mr. Cohen was sent back to prison, Mr. Trump commuted long-time friend and adviser Roger Stone’s prison sentence for lying under oath to lawmakers investigating Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.
Mr. Cohen served a year of his three-year sentence before being released due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in federal prisons.
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