Walt Nauta, personal aide of former US President Donald Trump, arrives at Alto Lee Adams Sr. US Courthouse, in Fort Pierce, Florida, US August 10, 2023.
Marco Bello | Reuters
The defense lawyer for Donald Trump’s valet Walt Nauta complained Friday that he received threats after the special counsel Jack Smith revealed that a Mar-a-Lago IT director pleaded guilty to giving false testimony in the former president’s classified documents criminal case.
The attorney, Stanley Woodward, represented IT director Yuscil Taveras when his client gave false testimony to a grand jury, according to Smith’s recent court filing.
Only after Taveras dropped Woodward and hired another attorney did he change his story, admitting he was told to destroy the security footage, Smith said in Tuesday’s deposition.
Woodward on Friday blasted Smith’s filing as a “brazen and blatant effort” to influence the trial judge and the “court of public opinion” by quoting from a sealed document submitted by Woodward.
Woodward’s anger at the prosecutor was laid out in his new filing in federal court for the Southern District of Florida, after Smith raised concerns about the defense attorney’s potential conflicts of interest in the case.
Woodward currently represents Nauta and other witnesses in the case, but no longer represents Taveras.
Trump, Nauta and Mar-a-Lago maintenance worker Carlos De Oliveira were charged in federal court in Florida with crimes related to Trump’s retention of classified documents after leaving the White House. They all pleaded not guilty.
Among other things, the defendants are accused of a scheme aimed at erasing security surveillance footage at Mar-a-Lago — Trump’s private club in Palm Beach, Florida — that reveals boxes of classified records. which is transferred there by Nauta and De Oliveira.
Nauta’s legal fees are being paid by Trump’s political action committee, according to the public election commission filing.
Woodward disputes the idea that he currently has a conflict of interest, and he asked Judge Aileen Cannon in his filing last Friday to submit a detailed rebuttal explaining his position.
Woodward also revealed Friday that Smith’s disclosure of the Taveras situation created blowback for the attorney.
“In the time since the government’s submission, defense counsel has received several threatening and/or abusive emails and phone calls.”
“This is the result of the Special Counsel’s callous disregard for how their unnecessary actions affect and influence the public and the lives of the individuals involved in this matter,” Woodward wrote.
De Oliveira is accused of asking Taveras to delete the footage at Trump’s behest.
On Tuesday, Smith filed a document raising concerns that Woodward has a conflict of interest because he may have to review his former client, Taveras.
Smith noted that Woodward was serving as Taveras’ attorney when the IT director testified before a Washington, DC, grand jury in March.
During that testimony, Taveras “repeatedly denied or claimed not to remember any contacts or conversations about security footage at Mar-a-Lago,” Smith wrote.
On June 20, Smith’s office informed Taveras, “through Mr. Woodward … that he is the target of a District of Columbia grand jury investigation into whether he committed perjury” during his March testimony, wrote the prosecutor in the confrontation.
After the chief federal district judge in Washington had a federal public defender advise Taveras about the potential conflict of being represented by Nauta’s attorney, Taveras told the judge that he “no longer wants to represented by Mr. Woodward,” Smith wrote.
And “immediately after” accepting the public defender as his new attorney, “Taveras retracted his earlier false testimony,” Smith wrote.
“Taveras also provided information implicating Nauta, De Oliveira, and Trump in efforts to delete security camera footage, as set forth in the superseding indictment,” the prosecutor wrote.
Smith asked Cannon, the Florida judge, to schedule a hearing on Woodward’s alleged conflict of interest with “Mr. Woodward’s clients present and independent counsel available to advise them if they want.”
In his filing Friday, Woodward wrote that Smith “did not, and still does not, allege any actual conflict with counsel’s representation of Mr. Nauta.”
“This is not done for the obvious fact that no conflict will arise unless and until Trump Employee 4 [as Taveras is identified in court filings] testified against Mr. Nauta,” Woodward wrote.
