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A newspaper chief was Donald Trump’s “eyes and ears” and killed unfavourable stories about him in the run-up to the 2016 election, a court has heard.

Trump has made history as the first former US president to face a criminal trial.

He stands accused of paying hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels in an effort to cover up their alleged affair and falsifying business records in order to do so.

David Pecker, the former boss of publisher AMI, took the stand as the first witness in the trial, as he described participating in a “catch and kill” scheme with Trump and Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen to bury unfavourable press coverage during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Manhattan’s criminal court also heard Mr Pecker, who signed a “non-prosecution” agreement with prosecutors after AMI admitted to making hush-money payments, describe his role as being the “eyes and ears” for Trump.

Mr Pecker said he would flag stories to Mr Cohen, who would check if they were true or not. This agreement was never put in writing but Mr Pecker divulged it to Dylan Howard, editor-in-chief of the National Enquirer, one of his publications.

Catch up: how the day unfolded in court

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Donald Trump waits for the start of proceedings in Manhattan criminal court.
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Trump waits for the start of proceedings. Pic Reuters

Mr Pecker told the court of a meeting he attended in August 2015 with Trump, Mr Cohen, and Hope Hicks, the communications director for the former president.

‘I would be the eyes and ears’

He said: “At that meeting with Donald Trump, they asked me what can I do to help the campaign.

“I said what I would do is I would run or publish positive stories about Mr Trump, and I would publish negative stories about his opponents.

“I said that I would also be the eyes and ears.”

In particular, Mr Pecker said that he would notify Cohen if he heard any negative stories relating to Trump and alleged relations with any women “because Mr Trump was well known as the most eligible bachelor and dated the most beautiful women”.

He added: “It was clear that, based on my past experience, that when someone was running for public office like this, it is very common for these women to call up magazines like the National Enquirer to try to sell their stories.”

The court heard of one such example where Mr Pecker paid $30,000 (£24,000) to buy a story about Trump allegedly fathering an illegitimate baby with a maid.

Pic: Reuters
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Trump was accused of hatching a “catch and kill” scheme to bury unfavourable press coverage during the 2016 presidential campaign. Pic: Reuters

Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump departs as his trial continues over charges that he falsified business records to conceal money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016, outside Trump Tower, in New York City, U.S. , April 23, 2024. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
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Trump waves to crowds outside court. Pic: Reuters

Mr Pecker said: “I immediately called Michael Cohen and told him exactly what I was told.

“I gave the name of the housekeeper in the penthouse and asked him to verify it first with the Trump Organisation payroll.”

Buying off negative press

Mr Pecker bought the story but said investigators found the story to be untrue and says Cohen told him it was “absolutely not true”.

He added: “I made the decision to buy the story because it could have been embarrassing to the campaign and Mr Trump.”

Hanging over today’s proceedings were allegations that Trump violated a gag order in social media posts and on his campaign website.

The gag order restricted Trump’s public speech on jurors, potential witnesses and some others involved in the case.

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Prosecutors asked the judge to fine Trump $10,000 (£8,000) for ten online posts they say violated the order, but the judge hadn’t made a decision by the end of the day’s proceedings.

Political opponents targeted

However, alongside protecting Trump’s image, the court heard that Mr Pecker allegedly targeted his political opponents.

He said: “I would run a Hillary Clinton story as being the enabler to a womaniser.”

The prosecution asked: “Did you believe it helped Trump’s campaign?”

Mr Pecker told the court it was mutually beneficial because it led to newspaper sales and benefited Trump’s campaign.

The court was told that Mr Pecker’s publisher would also run stories about Trump’s Republican opponents “based on the success of some of the candidates”.

He added: “I would receive a call from Michael Cohen, and he would direct me and direct Dylan Howard which candidate and which direction we should go.”

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National Enquirer headlines

Some headlines published by the Enquirer included:

• Bungling Surgeon Ben Carson Left Sponge in Patient’s Brain!

• Ted Cruz Shamed by Porn Star

• Boozin’ Ted Cruz Fixin’ To Lose

• Shocking Claims: Pervy Ted Cruz Caught Cheating – With 5 Secret Mistresses

• Anonymous Threat! Hackers Threaten Ted Cruz with Alleged Prostitution

• Donald Trump Blasts Ted Cruz’s Dad for Photo with JFK Assassin

Also amid today’s proceedings, it emerged that Mr Pecker was one of the first people to encourage Trump to run for president.

In early 2015, Mr Pecker says he told Trump that 80% of the readership of the National Enquirer wanted him to run for president.

He received an invitation to the announcement that Trump would run, made in June 2015, which the court heard read: “No one deserves to be there more than you.”

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The protests at US universities are about much more than Gaza and Israel

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The protests at US universities are about much more than Gaza and Israel

On the grass outside the university library, it is as though it never happened. 

The tents have been removed. The pavements have been sprayed. The graffiti removed.

Order and control have been restored. The protest has been silenced. For now at least.

A few streets away, at the university police station, an officer calls the names of the students arrested the night before.

On the steps in front of him, the bedraggled are waiting.

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Why are university students protesting in the US?
Inside pro-Palestinian protest as police break up UCLA encampment

Pic: Reuters
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Pic: Reuters

Police clash with pro-Palestinian demonstrators on the UCLA campus early on Thursday morning. Pic: AP
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Police clash with pro-Palestinian demonstrators on the UCLA campus early on Thursday morning. Pic: AP

Students, charged and released with a date in court, are here now to collect their belongings. They’re missing bags, belts, shoes, all lost in the chaos of the night before.

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From the very heart of the protest encampment, our cameras had captured the chaos.

Officers moving in. Tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse. Stun grenades to disorientate.

Police  detain a demonstrator, as they clear out the protest encampment in UCLA.
Pic: Reuters
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Police detain a demonstrator, as they clear out the protest encampment in UCLA.
Pic: Reuters

They were scenes which have stirred an already fevered debate about Israel and Gaza, yes, but about much more too. About America, about policing, and about free speech too.

President Biden said yesterday: “Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campuses, forcing the cancellation of classes and graduations – none of this is a peaceful protest.”

‘Wrong’ say the protesters. Their movement, they say, is the very essence of protest; of civil disobedience which is threaded through US college campus history.

Law enforcement official moves a tent at the protest encampment in support of Palestinians at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), as the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas continues, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., May 2, 2024. REUTERS/Aude Guerrucci
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Law enforcement official moves a tent at the protest encampment in support of Palestinians at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA)

Signs of the days-long protest on campus being gradually cleared.
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Signs of the days-long protest on campus being gradually cleared.

They reject any notion that they are threatening or violent. Yet the deeply divisive history of the Israel-Palestine conflict ensures that the beholder will so often be offended by the actions of the other side.

It was the students perceived antisemitism through their pro-Palestinian slogans which had drawn a group of pro-Israel protesters to the encampment earlier in the week.

The chaos of that night was reflected in a statement by the university’s student radio station which has been covering every twist.

This embrace turned out to be a thread of history
Image:
This embrace turned out to be a thread of history

“Counter protestors used bear mace, professional-grade fireworks and clubs to brutalize hundreds of our peers, UCLA turned a blind eye. Police were not called until hours into the onslaught and stood aside for over an hour as counter-protestors enacted racial, physical and chemical violence,” the statement from the UCLA Radio Managerial team said.

Watching the clear-up after the nighttime police sweep of the protesters I spotted two people embracing. A young man and an older woman.

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Professor recalls violent arrest at protest

It turned out to be a thread of history. One was a student who’d been arrested the night before.

The other was a student from a past time. Diane Salinger had been at New York’s Columbia University in 1968, at protests which now form a key chapter in American history.

Diane Salinger had been at New York’s Columbia University in 1968, at protests which now form a key chapter in American history
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Diane Salinger had been at New York’s Columbia University in 1968, at protests which now form a key chapter in American history

“I’m so proud of these people here. I’m so proud,” she told me.

“You know the civil unrest of the students back in ’68 and it continued for several years, it actually changed the course of the Vietnam War and hopefully this is going to do the same thing.”

But then, back at the police station, a conversation that hints at the wider challenges for America.

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‘Tom’ is a protester who wanted to remain anonymous – a graduate who feels politically deserted in his own country. For him, no government is better than any on offer.

'Tom' is a protester who wanted to remain anonymous - a graduate who feels politically deserted in his own country.
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‘Tom’ is a protester who wanted to remain anonymous – a graduate who feels politically deserted in his own country.

“The problem with our system is that we can’t rely on the police, we can’t rely on the military to keep us safe.

“When we need to make our voices heard, we need to make them heard, and the only way to do that without being repressed is by keeping each other safe and I think that last night and the last few months have really exemplified that,” he told me.

These protests are about more than Gaza. They are aligning a spectrum of dissent.

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California boat captain jailed over fire that killed 34 people

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California boat captain jailed over fire that killed 34 people

A scuba dive boat captain has been jailed for four years for criminal negligence over a fire that killed 34 people.

Captain Jerry Boylan was also sentenced to three years supervised release by a federal judge in Los Angeles, California.

The blaze on the vessel named Conception in September 2019 was the deadliest maritime disaster in recent American history.

Boylan was found guilty of one count of misconduct or neglect of ship officer last year.

Defendant, Conception's captain Jerry Boylan, right, arrives in federal court in Los Angeles, Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2023. Federal prosecutors are seeking justice for 34 people killed in a fire aboard a scuba dive boat called the Conception in 2019. The trial against Boylan began Tuesday with jury selection. Boylan has pleaded not guilty to one count of misconduct or neglect of ship officer. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)
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Captain Jerry Boylan. Pic: AP

The charge is a pre-Civil War statute, known colloquially as seaman’s manslaughter, and was designed to hold steamboat captains and crew responsible for maritime disasters.

In a sentencing memo, lawyers for Boylan – who is appealing – wrote: “While the loss of life here is staggering, there can be no dispute that Mr Boylan did not intend for anyone to die.

“Indeed, Mr Boylan lives with significant grief, remorse, and trauma as a result of the deaths of his passengers and crew.”

The Conception was anchored off Santa Cruz Island, 25 miles south of Santa Barbara, when it caught fire before dawn on the final day of a three-day voyage, sinking less than 30 metres from the shore.

Thirty-three passengers and a crew member died, trapped below deck.

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The victims included an environmental scientist, a Singaporean data scientist and a family of three sisters, their father and his wife.

Boylan jumped overboard, and four crew members who followed suit also survived.

FILE - The burned hull of the dive boat Conception is brought to the surface by a salvage team off Santa Cruz Island, Calif., on Sept. 12, 2019. A federal jury on Monday, Nov. 6, 2023, found scuba dive boat captain Jerry Boylan was criminally negligent in the deaths of 34 people killed in a fire aboard the vessel in 2019, the deadliest maritime disaster in recent U.S. history. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times via AP, File)
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The burned hull of the dive boat. Pic: AP

Boylan initially faced 34 counts of seaman’s manslaughter, meaning he could have faced a total of 340 years behind bars.

His lawyers argued the deaths were the result of a single incident and not separate crimes, so prosecutors instead charged Boylan with only one count.

While the criminal case has concluded, there are several ongoing lawsuits.

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Woman wins $1m lottery jackpot twice in 10 weeks

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Woman wins m lottery jackpot twice in 10 weeks

A woman has won a $1m prize on the lottery for the second time in 10 weeks.

Massachusetts State Lottery revealed Christine Wilson was the lucky ticketholder who hit the jackpot twice.

Ms Wilson, of Attleborough, Massachusetts, won her most recent prize playing the “100X Cash” $10 instant ticket game.

Back in February, she claimed the first $1m (£796,000) prize in the “Lifetime Millions” $50 (£40) instant ticket game.

On both occasions, she opted to receive her prize in the form of a one-time payment of $650,000 (£518,000).

When she won her first prize, Ms Wilson said that she planned to use some of her winnings to buy a new car.

She plans to put this latest windfall into savings.

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Ms Wilson bought her most recent ticket at Family Food Mart in the US town of Mansfield and the shop will receive a $10,000 (£7,900) bonus for its sale of the ticket, according to the Massachusetts State Lottery.

She bought her first $1m winning ticket at Dubs’s Discount Liquors in the same town.

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