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Monday is not Michael D. Cohen’s first day in a courtroom.
Mr. Cohen, who is Donald J. Trump’s former fixer, pleaded guilty in August 2018 to a variety of federal crimes, including campaign finance violations for his role in two hush-money deals with women who said they had sex with Mr. Trump. He also pleaded guilty to personal financial crimes unrelated to Mr. Trump, including tax evasion.
Three months later, Mr. Cohen was back in federal court to plead guilty once again. That time, he accepted responsibility for lying to Congress about plans to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, saying he did so out of loyalty to Mr. Trump.
His loyalty faded in 2018 as the authorities closed in on Mr. Cohen, and Mr. Trump shunned him. Mr. Cohen is now the star witness in Mr. Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan, which centers on a hush-money deal.
A judge sentenced Mr. Cohen to three years in prison for all the charges, and in May 2019, he reported to the medium-security federal prison and detention center in Otisville, N.Y., about 75 miles northwest of New York City.
He ultimately did not serve his full sentence. In 2020, Mr. Cohen was released on furlough during the coronavirus pandemic. But the Federal Bureau of Prisons sent him back behind bars after he refused to sign paperwork barring him from publishing a book during the remainder of his sentence.
A judge later called his second imprisonment “retaliatory” and ordered him released.
Ever since gaining his freedom, Mr. Cohen has fashioned himself as a standard-bearer of the anti-Trump resistance, seeking what he once called a “way to right some of the many wrongs I committed at his behest.” He published books titled “Disloyal” and “Revenge,” and created a podcast called “Mea Culpa.”
He testified at Mr. Trump’s civil fraud trial in Manhattan last year. Mr. Cohen took the stand to say that Mr. Trump had directed him to manipulate internal records to inflate the former president’s net worth. He also likened Mr. Trump to a “mob boss.”
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