I'm John Batchel with my colleague, Professor Richard Epstein of the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas, teaches law at NYU and University of Chicago.

This is a New York matter.

The mayor of the town, Eric Adams, under indictment for Tammany Hall activities,

taking money under false pretenses and deceiving the FBI about it,

a bevy of charges brought by the Department of Justice through the Southern District of New York.

Now at the direction of the Department of Justice dismissed.

It went before Judge, Judge Dale Ho,

who said that he will take the matter under advisement

and render a decision afterwards.

The puzzle for me, Richard, is the prosecution wants the case dismissed,

the defense wants the case dismissed. the defense wants the case dismissed.

The judge asked the mayor under oath, is this a quid pro quo?

And the mayor said no.

And therefore, what is the debate?

Well, let's go back.

The first thing to note is when they said they wanted the case dismissed,

they meant without prejudice rather than with

prejudice. That's a very unusual type situation to do, because usually these are final

settlements. But without prejudice means that they could renew it at any time. And so the argument

is not what it was that Adam said, but what he did. Was there a quid pro quo in the following form?

You will help us on the immigration front.

And what we will do is we will defer your prosecution until the time that you don't cooperate us with anymore.

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