Michael Cohen Has A Ploy To Reduce His Prison Sentence

Former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen is formally seeking a delayed and reduced prison sentence after claiming to have found a computer hard drive he wants to provide investigators.

In a letter sent Thursday to congressional Democrats, Cohen’s attorneys asked lawmakers to write a letter documenting Cohen’s cooperation with congressional committees as well as his willingness to hand over documents from the newly discovered hard drive.

Cohen’s lawyers said they plan to provide the letter to prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, where Cohen received a three-year prison sentence on Dec. 12.

Cohen said he recently accessed a hard drive that he claims contains 14 million files, including emails, voice recordings and attachments from Cohen’s computers and phones.

The letter, first reported by CNN, says that Cohen has reviewed only 3,500 files and is sorting through them to remove privileged information.

Cohen’s lawyers, Lanny Davis and Michael Monico, said that they hoped Cohen’s prison term “will be substantially postponed while he is fully cooperating with prosecutors and Congress.”

The former Trump fixer is scheduled to report to prison on May 6 to begin a three-year sentence. Cohen pleaded guilty in the Manhattan case on Aug. 21 to tax evasion, bank fraud and making illegal campaign contributions. He pleaded guilty in the special counsel’s investigation on Nov. 29 to lying to Congress about the extent of his efforts to negotiate building a Trump Tower in Moscow.

The letter provides no details about how Cohen found the hard drive or what other information it contains.

Cohen has testified publicly before the House Oversight and Reform Committee and privately before the House and Senate Intelligence Committees. Cohen testified about his knowledge of President Donald Trump’s business dealings, as well as his involvement in alleged hush payments to Stormy Daniels, the porn star who claims she had an affair with Trump in 2006.

Davis, a close ally of former President Bill and Hillary Clinton, has previously acknowledged Cohen’s cooperation with Congress was part of a ploy to reduce his prison sentence.