Also on today’s menu:
Vermont Man Charged In Concord Homicides
Eastman’s Smoking Gun
Truss Resigns As Prime Minister
Troudy Vaughan, a regional manager for CBRE real estate services company, which has been marketing the former Laconia State School property, outlined plans for almost 1,300 housing units, ranging from single-family residences to duplexes, triplexes, and apartments that would be accessible to people of “all income levels,” during a presentation on October 19. Plans also call for about 200,000 square feet of commercial office and retail space, while preserving half of the 217-acre property as open space.
The plan envisions a 250-room hotel and a conference center large enough to accommodate gatherings of as many as 1,000 people. It also suggests an urgent-care clinic, a child-care center, a pharmacy, and a memory-care facility, Vaughan said.
The proposal would have to be approved by the Governor’s Executive Council, but once the state agrees to sell the property to the unnamed developer, “the city is in the driver’s seat” as far as authorizing the phases of the development, according to Administrative Services Commissioner Charlie Arlinghaus.
Vermont Man Charged In Concord Homicides
Twenty-six-year-old Logan Levar Clegg, most recently of South Burlington, Vermont, is facing two counts of second-degree murder in the April 18, 2022, shooting deaths of Stephen and Djeswende Reid, the Concord couple that disappeared while out for a walk.
Vermont authorities arrested Clegg on October 19 on a New Hampshire fugitive-from-justice warrant while Clegg was being held at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans, Vermont, on an unrelated charge following his arrest on October 12.
Clegg’s arraignment on the fugitive-from-justice charge is scheduled to take place today at the Franklin County Superior Court in St. Albans, Vermont. Following his arraignment, New Hampshire authorities will seek Clegg’s extradition to New Hampshire.
Eastman’s Smoking Gun
Federal Judge David Carter has ruled that some of John Eastman’s emails with Donald Trump must be turned over to the Select Committee To Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol. Eastman argued that he was Trump’s attorney, and the communications were protected by the attorney-client privilege. Judge Carter disagreed and found that the privilege did not apply to all the emails because of the crime-fraud exception.
In his ruling, Carter first addressed whether the emails constituted “work product.” “Some portions of these emails do discuss litigation strategy, and to that extent, they are created in anticipation of litigation. However, for other portions, ‘[t]he true animating force behind these emails was advancing a political strategy: to persuade Vice President Pence to take unilateral action on January 6.’ These portions of the documents were not created in anticipation of litigation, so they are not protected work product.”
He continued, “[R]eview of the 524 protected documents shows that none are ‘pivotal’ to the Select Committee’s investigation. The majority of the documents include opinions and discussions about trial strategy in ongoing or anticipated lawsuits. … [T]his litigation was a ‘legitimate form of recourse, and is not tied to the investigation’s core purpose, which is to “investigate and report upon the facts, circumstances, and causes relating to the January 6, 2021, domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol.”’ Accordingly, none of these 524 shall be disclosed based on compelling need.”
However, he concluded that there were eight documents where the crime-fraud exception applied: “The crime-fraud exception applies when (1) a ‘client consults an attorney for advice that will serve [them] in the commission of a fraud or crime,’ and (2) the communications are ‘sufficiently related to’ and were made ‘in furtherance of’ the crime. It is irrelevant whether the scheme was ultimately successful.”
Carter’s conclusion was that “The emails show that President Trump knew that the specific numbers of voter fraud were wrong but continued to tout those numbers, both in court and to the public. The Court finds that these emails are sufficiently related to and in furtherance of a conspiracy to defraud the United States.”
Truss Resigns As Prime Minister
British Prime Minister Liz Truss resigned today after her policies triggered turmoil in financial markets and a rebellion in her party. Truss, who has been prime minister for just 45 days, acknowledged, “I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party.” Truss said she will remain in office for a few more days while her party seeks a leader who can unify its warring factions.
Just a day earlier, she had vowed to stay in power, saying she was “a fighter and not a quitter,” according to the Associated Press. However, the resignation of a senior minister amidst a barrage of criticism, and a vote in the House of Commons that descended into chaos and acrimony that forced Truss to abandon many of her economic policies proved to be too much to overcome.
Graham Brady, a senior Conservative lawmaker who oversees leadership challenges, assessed whether the prime minister still has the support of Tory members of Parliament and deemed she did not. Truss quit after a meeting with Brady.
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