WASHINGTON: Donald Trump has filed a $100 million claim against the US Justice Department alleging the 2022 FBI raid on his Florida home to recover classified documents was “political persecution.”
The claim, which was filed last week but only came to light on Monday, accuses Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray of seeking to “injure” the former president.
Trump was charged in Florida with 31 counts of “willful retention of national defense information” for refusing to return top-secret documents taken from the White House when he left office.
A federal judge dismissed the case last month on the grounds that Special Counsel Jack Smith, who brought the charges, was unlawfully appointed.
FBI agents, acting on a search warrant approved by a federal judge, raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence on August 8, 2022, to recover classified documents, including records from the Pentagon and CIA, which were allegedly being kept unsecured at his home.
Trump, the Republican party’s nominee in the 2024 presidential race, is seeking punitive damages of $100 million and to recover at least $15 million in legal costs, according to his claim.
“Garland and Wray should have never approved a raid and subsequent indictment of President Trump because the well-established protocol with former US presidents is to use non-enforcement means to obtain records of the United States,” the claim alleges.
“Garland and Wray decided to stray from established protocol to injure President Trump,” the claim says, in what it alleged was “a clear intent to engage in political persecution.”
The Justice Department has 180 days to respond to the claim, which was filed under the Federal Tort Claims Act. If the parties are unable to reach a settlement the suit would go to federal court.
Trump has a history of filing civil suits and then withdrawing them at the last minute.
He was convicted in New York in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover up hush money payments made to a porn star.
Trump also faces charges in Washington and Georgia related to efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.
Trump files $100 million claim against US Justice Department over raid on his Florida home
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Trump files $100 million claim against US Justice Department over raid on his Florida home
- Trump, the Republican party’s nominee in the 2024 presidential race, is seeking punitive damages of $100 million and to recover at least $15 million in legal costs, according to his claim
Second doctor in Matthew Perry overdose case sentenced to home confinement
- Dr. Mark Chavez, 55, a onetime San Diego-based physician, pleaded guilty in federal court in October
- Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett also sentenced Chavez to 300 hours of community service
LOS ANGELES: A second California doctor was sentenced on Tuesday to eight months of home confinement for illegally supplying “Friends” star Matthew Perry with ketamine, the powerful sedative that caused the actor’s fatal drug overdose in a hot tub in 2023.
Dr. Mark Chavez, 55, a onetime San Diego-based physician, pleaded guilty in federal court in October to a single felony count of conspiracy to distribute the prescription anesthetic and surrendered his medical license in November.
Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett also sentenced Chavez to 300 hours of community service. As part of his plea agreement, Chavez admitted to selling ketamine to another physician Dr. Salvador Plasencia, 44, who in turn supplied the drug to Perry, though not the dose that ultimately killed the performer. Plasencia, who pleaded guilty to four counts of unlawful drug distribution, was sentenced earlier this month to 2 1/2 years behind bars.
He and Chavez were the first two of five people convicted in connection with Perry’s ketamine-induced death to be sent off to prison.
The three others scheduled to be sentenced in the coming weeks — Jasveen Sangha, 42, a drug dealer known as the “Ketamine Queen;” a go-between dealer Erik Fleming, 56; and Perry’s former personal assistant, Iwamasa, 60.
Sangha admitted to supplying the ketamine dose that killed Perry, and Iwamasa acknowledged injecting Perry with it. It was Iwamasa who later found Perry, aged 54, face down and lifeless, in the jacuzzi of his Los Angeles home on October 28, 2023.
An autopsy report concluded the actor died from the acute effects of ketamine,” which combined with other factors in causing him to lose consciousness and drown.
Perry had publicly acknowledged decades of substance abuse, including the years he starred as Chandler Bing on the hit 1990s NBC television series “Friends.”
According to federal law enforcement officials, Perry had been receiving ketamine infusions for treatment of depression and anxiety at a clinic where he became addicted to the drug.
When doctors there refused to increase his dosage, he turned to unscrupulous providers elsewhere willing to exploit Perry’s drug dependency as a way to make quick money, authorities said. Ketamine is a short-acting anesthetic with hallucinogenic properties that is sometimes prescribed to treat depression and other psychiatric disorders. It also has seen widespread abuse as an illicit party drug.
