Psycho 1: The summit meeting we’d like to see

by David Benjamin

“Potential criminal defendants who are prosecuted on more recent, ‘easier’ grounds are not necessarily brought to justice on each and every instance of wrongdoing. Al Capone famously went to prison for tax evasion, not for his violent crimes.”

— Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post

SOMEWHERE OFF ROUTE 1, FREDERICKSBURG, Va.— They had maintained scrupulous secrecy before and after gathering in a Hampton Inn (or possibly a Holiday Inn) function room. As a group, they composed the most powerful prosecutorial summit meeting in U.S. history. In the minutes of the meeting, which have since been kept in a hermetically sealed Mason jar on Funk & Wagnalls’ porch, the group’s members are identified only by coded titles: NYDA, FCGADA, NYAG, SDNY, USADC and MGfromDC. 

The following is a slightly abridged transcript of the summit.

NYDT: I object to referring to the subject of this discussion as “Person 1.” This is a grossly inadequate characterization of a raving, slobbering, rabid, bull-in-a-china-shop lunatic. I move that we call a spade a spade and refer to him officially as Psycho 1. All those in favor?

(Motion adopted unanimously, with one abstention)

NYAG: Down to business. First, let’s resolve that Psycho 1 has eluded his just desserts for decades by assembling motley but effective teams of shysters, crooked accountants, pathetic offspring and bought-off bankers to con, hustle and slither his way out of the consequences of his lifelong career of crime. The maddening element in this strategy is that he openly admits—and boasts about—his every caper. This method somehow enables him to buy or squirm his way out of every offense. He has stuck his thumb in the eyes of prosecutors, stiffed and screwed his own gullible crew of ambulance-chasers, flashed the finger at judges, turned litigation into a glacier and rendered the legal system a profit center. 

FCGADA: And that’s not all. He has carpetbagged his big, soft ass into state and local governments buttonholing elected officials and administrators—even a U.S. Attorney!—cajoling, whining, begging, bullying, raging and intimidating. He’s running amok!

SDNY: Yes. we all know that, girls. The question is, what are we gonna do?

NYDA: I hate to mention it, but isn’t that ultimately up to MGfromDC?

MGfromDC: (Silence)

SDNY: I think we all agree here that we’re never gonna get Psycho 1 into actual jail. Any criminal action against the slippery gasbag is gonna string out—in pre-trial motions, dismissal petitions, recusal demands, subpoena refusals, jurisdiction disputes, extradition battles, juror challenges and other forms of legalistic legerdemain. If we go by the book we’ve been using, he’ll be a hundred years old, still scot-free, snuffling down Big Macs and super-size fries while lounging in a Coca-Cola hot tub with Margie Greene and Herschel Walker.

FCGADA: Ew. Gross!

NYDA: Exactly! We must abandon the pipe dream of seeing Psycho 1 behind bars in an orange jumpsuit—although it would go nicely with his skin. Our plan must boil down to nailing him on a single crime, one so clear and obvious that no all-white jury on earth would acquit Psycho 1 and no judge in his right mind—even one of his handpicked hacks—could find grounds to reverse his conviction.

NYDT: That’s true! One felony rap would forbid Psycho 1 from seeking any federal office. Today, Psycho 1 holds over his party, over the American people and their fading hopes for democracy the monstrous threat that he will regain the White House—by any means necessary—and declare himself and his children the Imperial Family of the former United States.

FCGADA: If we could pull that off, we’d be, thank God almighty, free at last.

NYAG: Amen, sister.

FCGADA: Hallelujah.

SDNY: Fine, but we need a crime. We need a jurisdiction.

USADC: I got that. Psycho 1 has committed federal crimes in my backyard. Lots of them. Here’s the simplest, easiest example: For four years, the sloppy bastard snatched papers off his desk and ripped them up with his bare hands, crumpled and shredded them. He ordered his flock of flunkies to make bonfires of records that belonged not to him but to the American people.

NYDT: Okay, there it is. We have a violation of the Presidential Records Act. And there’s proof!

USADC: Tons of documents ripped, shredded and mangled, many taped back together. Dozens of witnesses to the mayhem, ready to testify, fearful of being tried as accomplices. So, what we do—we take a handful of mutilated papers to a grand jury, obtain an indictment in one day, go to court the next week, get an open-and-shut conviction and then recommend leniency from the judge.

FCGADA: Leniency?

USADC: A three-month suspended sentence. No fine. No court costs.

NYAG: Because…

NYDT: … Now he’s a convict. Psycho 1 can do nothing to erase that fatal stain from his rap sheet. He’s ineligible to run for office. He can threaten to run, but people will laugh in his face. He abdicates his dominion over the Grand Old Party. Fox News forsakes him. Probably, he goes on razzle-dazzling the mass of cultists who regard him as the Second Coming and the fount of all grievance. He might even continue with his cockamamie rallies. But the crowds shrink. Serious people cease to take Psycho 1 seriously. Left to his own meager wits, he spends his declining days sitting on a bed in his underpants flipping poker cards into a fedora.

FCGADA: A lovely vision.

SDNY: But what if he appeals?

NYAG: Let him.

USADC: Yeah, ’cause if he does, we turn the tables. We deploy against him the same tactics he’s used all his life to delay his day in court and forestall his rightful fate. If he can abuse the legal system by stringing out a simple prosecution into the reincarnation of Jarndyce v. Jarndyce, why can’t we?

NYDT: Exactly. There’s not a court in the federal system that would embarrass itself by reversing a trivial conviction and a suspended 90-day sentence, especially with reams of evidence and dozens of witnesses on the record.

FCGADA: But what about the Supreme Court? He has a six-lapdog majority Three of his personal Justices were bought and paid for up-front. 

SDNY: Fuggedaboudit. Let Psycho 1 appeal his little wrist-slap to the Supremes. How long before the case finally gets heard? Two years? Three years? Five! And how much will it cost him? He says he’s rich. Let’s see him prove it. Let’s see if he can recruit lawyers capable of arguing before the Supreme Court—for free! After all, he never pays lawyers with his own money. How long will all those suckers in fifty-dollar MAGA hats keep taking their Christmas Club savings from their kids and mailing it to a misanthropic “billionaire” in Florida?

USADC: Every day and dollar our friend Psycho 1 spends litigating appeals is a day and a dollar that doesn’t go into his campaign of hate and bigotry. As long as he’s in court, whining and raging over his tiny felony, he’s not spewing lies and forcing Republicans to their knees to lick the shoe polish off his Florsheims.

FCGADA: By Jove, I think we have a plan.

USADC: We do! But it would be even better if we knew the Department of Justice is backing us up.

MGfromDC: (Silence)