Trump Pardons Ken Kurson who was charged by district attorney

 Key points

• Ken Kurson has been charged with cyber-related crimes by the Manhattan District Attorney.

• Kurson is a former editor of journals and colleague of Jared Kushner. Then-President Donald Trump forgiven him in January.

• The Trump Organization and its senior financial officer Allen Weisselbérg are also pursued by Cyrus Vance Jr., Manhattan District Attorney.

On Wednesday, the district attorney of Manhattan accused Ken Kurson, a friend of his former associate Jared Kushner and his ex-wife, of cyberstalking, months after he was forgiven for alleged cyber crimes against others by then-President Donald Trump.

Kurson, 52, is accused of eavesdropping and criminal offense for illegally having access to his wife’s communications from 2015 to 2016 while he was Chief Editor of the Kushner Observer Media Group.

Kurson used malware to get passwords and access his wife’s Gmail and Facebook accounts, according to Manhattan District Attorney, Cyrus Vance, Jr.

Prosecutions claim that the private Facebook conversations he allegedly received and distributed in an anonymous way were illegal.

In addition, in Trump’s company The Trump Organization, the Vance office conducts a criminal inquiry. Vance charged a multi-year conspiracy earlier this summer to dodge the organization and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg. The Company and its CFO have filed no pleas for guilty.

He was arrested and freed in Manhattan court on Wednesday afternoon on his own account. Kurson is living in New Jersey. His attorney Mr. Marc Mukasey did not answer requests for comments.

Last year, federal authorities accused Kurson of the same charges relating to the alleged cyber hacking of three people. He was initially imprisoned two years after he retired from the Trump appointment as a Director of the Humanities National Endowment.

Apart from the three victims in this instance, FBI Special Agents have acquired information that Kurson has engaged in similar harassing patterns with regard to several other people between about September 2015 and December 2015, according to the footnote in the 2020 criminal complaint.

This previously unloaded behavior would include unauthorized access to email and social media accounts; installing software on a computer that is used without your permission and your knowledge to monitor keystrokes and internet use.

Trump forgave Kurson before the federal lawsuit could take place in January. Ken Kushner is the son-in-law of Trump and was previously a top advisor to the White House.

Post pardon

No state or local crimes are subject to pardons given by the President.

Vance added on Wednesday in the statement that they are not going to take President Pardons as a free pass for New York’s well-connected.

Vance said that Mr. Kurson started a cybercrime and manipulation campaign and abuse at New York Observer, and he’s now being held responsible by the people of New York. He was the publisher of The Observer, a Kushner publisher.

Previously, efforts by Vance to prosecute President Paul Manafort of Trump’s 2016 campaign for financial crimes have been rejected. A State Court ruled that double-dangered protection was forbidden since the federal authorities had previously tried Manafort for conduct that matched the accusations presented by Vance in a state criminal prosecution.

Vance’s allegations against Kurson, though, differ from last year’s federal prosecutors. Also, because Kurson’s criminal case never had been heard, the case of Vance might avoid double jeopardy.