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A4 U.S. NEWS
Wednesday 28 June 2023
Judge, rejecting Trump arguments, signals he’ll let case stay New York

By JENNIFER PELTZ and marks after a hearing
LARRY NEUMEISTER lasting over three hours,
Associated Press Hellerstein made several
NEW YORK (AP) — A fed- comments indicating that
eral judge in New York City to move the case, Trump
signaled Tuesday that the needs definitive proof that
state criminal hush mon- he was acting in his capac-
ey prosecution of former ity as president rather than
President Donald Trump tending to private affairs in
will soon be returned to his dealings with Cohen.
state court because Trump The judge said the argu-
cannot prove that he was ment by Trump's attorneys
acting in his capacity as that the private act of hir-
president when he made ing Cohen and paying him
payments to his private at- out of his pocket was re-
torney. lated to his official duties as
Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein president "sounds a little far
said he saw "no relation- fetched, but that's the ar-
ship to any official act of gument."
the president" in the ac- Later, the judge noted
tions cited in a prosecution that there was not much
that led Trump to plead evidence of exactly what
not guilty in state court in role Cohen served and
April to 34 felony counts of Former President Donald Trump sits at the defense table with his legal team in a Manhattan court, what duties he performed
falsifying business records April 4, 2023, in New York. Associated Press to help determine whether
to hide 2016 hush money what he did could be con-
payouts to bury allegations The judge said there was cover up payments made ing had affairs with either sidered to be within Trump's
of extramarital sexual en- "no reason to believe that in 2017 to his former lawyer, woman. presidential duties.
counters. an equal measure of jus- Michael Cohen, to com- Trump's lawyers have said "We have the invoices,"
He said he'll officially rule tice could not be rendered pensate him for orchestrat- those payments to Cohen the judge said, referencing
within two weeks on Trump's by the state court." ing payouts to porn star were legitimate legal ex- a year's worth of monthly
effort to move the prosecu- Trump was indicted on Stormy Daniels and Play- penses and not part of any $35,000 payments to Co-
tion to federal court from charges that he falsified boy model Karen McDou- cover-up. hen. "But no proof of what
state court. records at his company to gal. Trump has denied hav- Before he made final re- he did." q

U.S. arrests 4 Mexican nationals in 2022 deaths of 53 migrants

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — U.S. The driver and another Mexico by sharing routes, death, serious bodily injury from Guatemala, told The
authorities on Tuesday an- man were arrested shortly guides, stash houses, trucks and placing lives in jeop- Associated Press that the
nounced the arrests of four after the migrants were and trailers, some of which ardy. Each man faces a smugglers had covered the
more people in last year’s found. They were charged were stored at a private maximum penalty of life in trailer’s floor with what she
smuggling deaths of 53 with smuggling resulting in parking lot in San Antonio. prison if convicted. believes was powdered
migrants, including eight death and conspiracy. The new defendants are Ri- A federal grand jury in- chicken bouillon, appar-
children, who were left in a The four new arrests were ley Covarrubias-Ponce, 30; dictment alleges that the ently to throw off any dogs
tractor trailer in the scorch- made Monday in Hous- Felipe Orduna-Torres, 28; four men exchanged the at the checkpoint.
ing Texas summer. ton, San Antonio and Mar- Luis Alberto Rivera-Leal, 37; names of migrants who Another survivor, Adan Lara
Authorities said on the an- shall, Texas. Authorities said and Armando Gonzales- would be smuggled in a Vega, said the truck was
niversary of the June 27, the smuggling operation Ortega, 53. All are charged truck. Orduna-Torres pro- already hot when it left Lar-
2022, tragedy that the four transported migrants from with conspiracy to trans- vided the address in the edo and that the trapped
Mexican nationals were Guatemala, Honduras and port immigrants resulting in Texas border city of Lar- migrants soon started cry-
aware that the trailer’s edo where they would be ing, and pleading for water.
air-conditioning unit was picked up, and Gonzalez- Some took turns breathing
malfunctioning and would Ortega met them there. through a single hole in the
not blow cool air to the mi- The four then coordinated wall, while others pounded
grants trapped inside dur- the trip, exchanged mes- on the walls and yelled to
ing the nearly three-hour sages about the truck’s get the driver’s attention.
ride. When the trailer was progress on the drive to San “Human smugglers prey on
opened in San Antonio, Antonio. migrants’ hope for a better
48 migrants were already The truck was found on a life but their only priority is
dead. Another 16 were remote San Antonio road, profit,” Attorney General
taken to hospitals, where and arriving police officers Merrick Garland said in a
five more died. detained driver Homero statement.
It was the deadliest trag- Zamorano Jr. after spotting “Tragically, 53 people who
edy to claim the lives of him hiding in some nearby had been loaded into a
migrants smuggled across brush. tractor-trailer in Texas and
the border from Mexico. Roberto Marquez, of Dallas, adds a flower a makeshift memorial Surveillance video cap- endured hours of unimagi-
The dead included 27 from at the site where officials found dozens of people dead in an tured footage of the nable cruelty lost their lives
Mexico, 14 from Honduras, abandoned semitrailer containing suspected migrants, June 29, 18-wheeler passing through because of this heartless
seven from Guatemala 2022, in San Antonio, Texas. a Border Patrol checkpoint. scheme.”q
and two from El Salvador, Associated Press One survivor, a 20-year-old