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Fani Wilis, the prosecutor in the Trump case, was caught in an extramarital affair scandal. Photo/Reuters
Fulton County’s first female district attorney avoided the embarrassment of being removed from the most high-profile case of her career – prosecuting Donald Trump – because of her affair with a prosecutor she hired. But he hadn’t heard the end of all this.
Fani Willis was preparing to start her new role as district attorney of Fulton County in Georgia when Donald Trump made a call to a prominent Republican in the state that would disrupt her work for the next few years.
On January 2, 2021, the former president called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and asked him to “find 11,780 votes”, the number he needed to defeat Joe Biden, who had won the state and the 2020 presidential election weeks earlier.
Audio of the phone conversation was leaked to US media the next day, setting off a massive political and legal firestorm on Willis’ first day in office.
“How quickly I knew that an investigation might be needed was on day one,” Willis told USA Today in 2022.
Two and a half years after that phone call, in August 2023, a Fulton County grand jury decided to indict Trump and 18 other people for attempting to overturn the state’s election results.
Trump’s lawyers called the charges “shocking and absurd.”
Who is Fani Willis? Georgia Prosecutor Who Wanted to Defeat Trump, But Got Caught in an Infidelity Scandal
1. Work professionally
Photo/Reuters
According to the BBC, Willis is known by colleagues in Georgia and those who have worked with him as a tenacious prosecutor capable of securing convictions in important and complex cases.
“He had a reputation as someone who was always prepared,” said Melissa Redmon, who worked in the Fulton County district attorney’s office at the same time as Willis. “Given the types of cases he prosecutes, that requires a tremendous amount of dedication.”
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2024-03-19 00:29:01
