Elisabeth Haub School of Law News

Starting small is standard practice for such a sweeping investigation, according to Bennett Gershman, a Pace University law professor and former Manhattan prosecutor. "There are early indictments, then superseding indictments, then added charges," he told Law360. "This is a high-stakes investigation. It's the biggest case of the century. You take it step by step."

"This is a preliminary charging document, as I see it," Gershman said. "You've got an ironclad case against Weisselberg, an ironclad case against the Trump Org, and they want to make that very clear right out front."

“He’s in big trouble.” That’s how Pace University law Professor Bennett Gershman describes the legal jeopardy Weisselberg, a 73 year old father and grandfather, now fines himself in. “Yeah he cheated on 1.7 million dollars of taxes, that's tax fraud, that's grand larceny” said Gershman.

For Bennett Gershman, a law professor at Pace University and a former Manhattan attorney, an indictment should be a matter of "days now, not weeks."

"You’re talking about something that is totally unique in American history. People are talking about what’s common, what's usual. Throw that out the window," said Bennett Gershman, a law professor at Pace University who previously spent six years as a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office, referring to the unprecedented nature of investigating a former president and his business.

Bennett Gershman, a former prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office for six years and now a law professor at Pace University, said it's not typical to bring a prosecution for allegedly neglecting to pay taxes on corporate benefits and perks, but said the investigation is unique.

“Such a child would lack the capacity to understand that a penis and vagina could make a baby,” said Bridget J. Crawford, an expert on guardianship law at Pace University law school. “And that certainly is not the Britney Spears case.”

"The law is the law. Here's the simple issue, what are they afraid of, that people will know the truth?" asks Randolph McLaughlin, a law professor at Pace University. "They're claiming that's part of the FOIL law but I think it's just an effort to stop people from getting access to the records that they need to determine whether or not their police department is functioning efficiently, constitutionally, or abusively," said McLaughlin.

Pace University environmental law professor Katrina Fischer Kuh said it's worth comparing the climate torts to Juliana v. U.S., in which a group of young people claim the federal government is unconstitutionally pushing policies that exacerbate climate change.