A grand jury must consider whether to indict the 2024 GOP frontrunner donald trump in connection with alleged attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 elections in Georgia. If charged, this would be his fourth this year.
Attorneys following the investigation of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, including some who have worked with her in the past, expect her to invoke Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, which based on the federal act of the same name. , in accordance with the Wall Street Journal.
“The signs are certainly pointing in that direction,” said Georgia State University law professor Anthony Michael Kreis.
Under the RICO Act, if prosecutors prove that there is an organization of people who commit crimes together on a recurring basis, the members can be prosecuted for the group’s crimes. The federal statute, which builds on state law, was enacted in the 1970s to help bring down the mob.
When Willis began his investigation in 2021, he hired John Floyd, one of Georgia’s leading experts on racketeering charges, to advise the investigation.
Clint Rucker, a former Fulton County prosecutor who worked closely with Willis on the Atlanta school cheating case, said the investigative team of the trump The case had been sent to a hotel for a week to study the RICO Act.
“It was a big deal because it wasn’t a gang case,” Rucker said.
Rucker said he expects Willis to use the RICO Act trump case, as he has already used it successfully in the case of school cheating.
The list of charges being considered by prosecutors also includes criminal solicitation to commit electoral fraud and conspiracy to commit electoral fraud, as well as solicitation of a public official or politician to dereliction of duty and permission to destroy, deface or remove ballots.
The potential indictment comes as Trump faces three other impeachments. The first of which comes from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg this spring, who was charged with falsifying business records. Two more have come from special counsel Jack Smith, one related to the alleged retention of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after the end of Trump’s presidency, and the most recent related to alleged attempts to revoke the results of the 2020 elections. .
This is a breaking story and will be updated.