NEW YORK — It’s all up to the jury now.
After seven weeks of legal wrangling and tawdry testimony, the first criminal trial of an American president moved to a jury of Donald Trump’s peers Wednesday morning, the final stage of the landmark trial.
Trump’s fate is in the hands of those 12 New Yorkers who will weigh whether to brand him as a felon. It could take them hours, days or even weeks to reach a verdict.
The jurors spent more than four hours deliberating on Wednesday without reaching a verdict.
Judge Juan M. Merchan had invited the jurors to send him a note if they were confused about the law, or wanted to revisit testimony from the trial. And they took him up on the offer, buzzing the court officer to relay a message requesting four excerpts from the testimony.
On Thursday, a court reporter will read that testimony to the jury, most of which comes from David Pecker, the former publisher of The National Enquirer, who prosecutors say was part of a conspiracy to suppress unflattering stories on Trump’s behalf during the 2016 election. Another portion of testimony relates to Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer who was the prosecution’s star witness.
Before the jurors began deliberating Wednesday, Merchan delivered an array of legal instructions to guide their decision-making. He impressed on them the gravity of their task but also said that the defendant — even a former president — is their peer.
“As a juror, you are asked to make a very important decision about another member of the community,” Merchan said, referring to the defendant.
The Manhattan charges stem from a hush-money deal that Cohen struck with a porn actor in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign. Prosecutors charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records, saying he disguised his reimbursement of Cohen as ordinary legal expenses.
On Wednesday morning, Merchan laid out the legal instructions to guide their discussions. He described to them the legal meaning of the word “intent” and the concept of the presumption of innocence.
Then, Merchan explained each of the 34 charges of falsifying business records that Trump faces, one for each document the prosecution says that Trump falsified. It was the most important guidance that the judge offered during the trial.
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