NEW YORK — Former lawyer Michael Cohen began unspooling what prosecutors hope will be a critical thread of evidence in Donald Trump’s hush money trial, tying the former president directly to a criminal scheme to falsify business records to illegally conceal paying an adult-film actress.
After years working as a hotheaded, sharp-tongued attack dog for Trump, Cohen was calm and collected in his initial hours on the witness stand in Manhattan criminal court, where he told the jury about financial transactions that are now the basis for 34 charges against Trump for allegedly falsifying business records.
