Trump Tried to Delete Mar-a-Lago Security Footage to Thwart Investigators

The Justice Department has brought additional charges against former president Donald Trump alleging that Trump and two of his employees conspired to destroy Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage requested by federal authorities.

In the new superseding indictment, Carlos de Oliveira, a maintenance worker at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, joins Trump and his aide Walt Nauta as a defendant in the case brought by the Justice Department in June. The new charges against the former president and his employees include “Corruptly Altering, Destroying, Mutilating or Concealing a Document, Record, or Other Object,” as well as “Altering, Destroying, Mutilating, or Concealing an Object.”

Prosecutors allege that on June 25, 2022, the day after investigators had requested “[a]ny and all surveillance records, videos, images, photographs and/or CCTV from internal cameras” at certain locations at the Mar-a-Lago Club, de Oliveira met with a Mar-a-Lago IT employee, allegedly at Nauta’s direction. De Oliveira allegedly told the employee something to the effect of “the boss” wanting the server containing the security footage “deleted.” The employee replied that he would need to reach out to his supervisor.

The indictment claims that de Oliveira spoke multiple times on the phone with Trump, including a conversation in which Trump promised he’d get de Oliveira an attorney.

According to a June CNN report, de Oliveira was seen in surveillance footage helping Nauta move boxes out of a storage room that was later examined by investigators and Trump’s attorneys.

De Oliveira is charged separately for allegedly lying to the FBI in a voluntary interview. The indictment includes a snippet of an interview transcript. When questioned about whether he’d taken part in moving around Trump’s presidential boxes, de Oliveira repeatedly said, “No,” adding that he, “Never saw nothing.”

Last month, the former president pleaded not guilty to 42 federal counts related to his handling of classified material. The previous charges leveled against Trump include conspiracy to obstruct justice, corruptly concealing a record or document, concealing a document in a federal investigation, scheme to conceal, false statements and representations.

Read the full updated indictment here: Trending Morrissey Slams Sinead O'Connor Tributes: 'You Praise Her Now Only Because It Is Too Late' Conservatives Are Furious That Nancy Mace Has Premarital Sex Trump Tried to Delete Mar-a-Lago Security Footage to Thwart Investigators Netflix’s ‘The Lady of Silence’ May Be the Year’s Best True Crime Doc

This story was updated at 7:45 p.m. to include additional details regarding charges brought against Trump, Walt Nauta, and Carlos de Oliveira.