Michael Cohen has hired New York lawyer Guy Petrillo to represent him in a federal investigation into his business dealings, and has told associates he wants President Donald Trump, his former boss, to pay his legal fees, according to people familiar with the matter.
.. The Trump campaign had been footing the bill for some of Mr. Cohen’s legal expenses, paying nearly $230,000 to McDermott, Will & Emery LLP between October 2017 and January 2018, according to Federal Election Commission records and a person familiar with the matter. But those payments helped cover Mr. Cohen’s legal representation in the separate Russia investigation, not in the probe of his business dealings.
The Trump family had also financed a portion of Mr. Cohen’s legal bills in the latter probe, paying for the review of documents seized by prosecutors in an April raid of his properties, but hadn’t agreed or offered to cover his full fees, according to people familiar with the matter.
Cohen looks to force Michael Avenatti to stop talking about Stormy Daniels case
The motion for a restraining order, filed late Thursday in U.S. District Court in California by Michael Cohen, accuses Avenatti of having a “seemingly unquenchable thirst for publicity” and argues that his frequent Twitter postings and TV appearances violate California rules of professional conduct for lawyers.
The publicity is “likely to result in Mr. Cohen being deprived of his right to a fair trial,” the motion reads. It “threatens to turn what should be a solemn Federal Court proceeding into a media circus.”
.. Brent H. Blakely, who filed the motion on Cohen’s behalf, alleges that since Daniels filed suit, Avenatti has made more than 120 media appearances and issued at least 439 tweets relating to the lawsuit or to Cohen. The motion claims that Avenatti has “repeatedly denigrated Mr. Cohen, predicted that Mr. Cohen would be indicted for bank fraud, wire fraud, campaign finance violations, and accused Mr. Cohen of hiring a ‘thug’ to allegedly threaten Ms. Clifford.”
Attorneys for Michael Cohen, Trump’s Lawyer, Are Quitting His Case
Firm expected to cease representation after review of seized documents for client-attorney privilege
Mr. Cohen’s attorneys are reviewing more than 3.7 million documents federal prosecutors seized in an April raid of Mr. Cohen’s home, office and hotel room to designate which communications they see as protected by attorney-client privilege.. Stephen Ryan, Todd Harrison and others at the firm McDermott, Will & Emery LLP, which has been representing Mr. Cohen since June 2017, will cease doing so after that review is complete, the person said... Mr. Cohen doesn’t yet have a replacement law firm but is searching for a federal criminal lawyer in New York, people familiar with the matter said. Mr. Cohen wants to hire a lawyer with close ties to the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, the people said.
Pressure on Michael Cohen intensifies as Mueller stays focused on the Trump attorney
Cohen, who is now in a dispute with his attorneys about some of his legal bills, plans to seek new representation soon, the people said. He wants to find a New York lawyer more familiar with the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan, they said.
.. In Washington, Mueller has been examining Cohen’s role in at least two episodes involving Russian interests, as The Post has previously reported.
One area of interest to the special counsel is negotiations Cohen undertook during the 2016 campaign to help the Trump Organization build a tower in Moscow, according to people familiar with the probe. Cohen brought Trump a letter of intent in October 2015 from a Russian developer to build a Moscow project. Later, he sent an email to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s chief spokesman seeking help to advance the stalled project. He has said he did not recall receiving a response.
.. Another area that Mueller’s team has explored is a proposal to end tensions in Ukraine, viewed by some as a plan that would benefit Russia
.. The meeting was organized by Felix Sater, a Trump business partner who had also worked to broker the deal to build a Trump Tower in Moscow during the presidential campaign.
The back-channel proposal offered a pathway for resolving the Ukrainian dispute that could have eventually led to the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Russia, a top goal of Putin.
.. Cohen told the news outlet that he took it to Washington and left it in Flynn’s office days before Flynn was fired.
.. But in interviews last year with The Post, Cohen called that account “fake news” and denied that he gave the proposal to Flynn or that he had ever said he had done so. Instead, Cohen told The Post he threw away the unopened envelope in a trash can at his New York apartment.
“I never looked at it,” Cohen said. “I never turned it over to anyone.”
.. Cohen also told The Post that Artemenko indicated to him that his peace initiative for Ukraine came with Russian support. “He said Russia was on board — the Russian government,”
.. Artemenko said he met repeatedly with U.S. officials, including members of Congress, to promote the proposal in Washington. The meetings, he said, he were set up by Curt Weldon, a Republican former congressman from Pennsylvania.
.. He said the nuclear power plan would have been a blow to Russia because it would have provided independent power to neighboring states that had been dependent on Russian energy sources. “Since this was an anti-Russia energy development proposal, it was no surprise to me that U.S. officials would support this project,” Sater said.