A judge has ordered US president-elect Donald Trump to be sentenced next week in his New York hush money case – but has suggested he will not jail him.
In a surprise move, Trump‘s sentencing in the case has been set for 10 January – a little over a week before his inauguration on 20 January.
Judge Juan Merchan, who presided over Trump’s trial, signalled in a written decision that he would sentence the former and future president to what is known as a conditional discharge, in which a case gets dismissed if a defendant avoids re-arrest.
Trump was convicted in May of 34 counts of falsifying business records, relating to an alleged scheme to hide a hush money payment to adult actress Stormy Daniels.
The judge said: “While this court as a matter of law must not make any determination on sentencing prior to giving the parties and defendants, opportunity to be heard, it seems proper at this juncture to make known the court’s inclination to not impose any sentence of incarceration, a sentence authorised by the conviction but one the people concede they no longer view as a practicable recommendation.”
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