Prosecutors allege Trump ‘orchestrated a criminal scheme’ as trial for ex-president begins [Video]

Donald Trump “orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election” a prosecutor said in his opening statement in a New York courtroom as the first-ever criminal trial of a former U.S. president got under way.

“This case is about conspiracy of fraud,” prosecutor Matthew Colangelo told 12 jurors and six alternates. Colangelo said they would hear Trump working out the details of a scheme to pay and hide hush money payments in his own voice on recorded conversations.

Colangelo told jurors that Trump engaged in a “catch and kill” conspiracy with his former lawyer Michael Cohen and David Pecker, then the publisher of the National Enquirer, to cover up unflattering information about Trump and help him defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.

That included payments to women who said they had sexual encounters with Trump, including a $130,000 US payment to Stephanie Clifford, known as the porn performer Stormy Daniels, …