Ex-Trump campaign manager Manafort seeks to move trial

US President Donald Trump's former campaign manager Paul Manafort has requested a delay his criminal trial and moving it away from Washington, where a fair trial would be "impossible" due to widespread negative press coverage against him.

Manafort's attorneys asked a federal judge on Friday to move the trial from Alexandria, Virginia, to Roanoke, Virginia, arguing that a change of venue was necessary for his Sixth Amendment right to trial by an impartial jury, the New York Times reported.

He has been charged in two jurisdictions with a host of federal crimes as part of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's inquiry into Russia's influence on the presidential campaign.

Mueller had indicted Manafort on charges including bank and tax fraud but the motions filed on Friday were Manafort's latest attempt to stall the legal process, reports said.

According to Manafort's lawyers, Roanoke is in a smaller media market where potential jurors would be less likely to be influenced by news media coverage of the case. The defence also suggested that Roanoke offered a pool of jurors with more "balanced" political views.

"Manafort's legal issues and the attendant daily media coverage have become theatre in the continuing controversy surrounding President Trump and his election," his lawyers wrote.

They added that it would be "difficult, if not impossible, to divorce the issues in this case from the political views of potential jurors".

Manafort's trial in Alexandria is set to begin July 25. He is also scheduled to go on trial in September in a separate case in Washington.

His lawyers asked to delay the first trial until after the one in Washington is finished. The Special Counsel opposed that motion, according to paperwork filed by the defence.

Manafort was jailed in June after a federal judge revoked his house arrest over allegations of witness tampering in Mueller's investigation.

Defence lawyers earlier said that Manafort was locked in a jail cell in Virginia for 23 hours a day, excluding visits from his attorneys and had been in solitary confinement because the facility can't guarantee his safety.

The lawyers asked a federal appeals court to overturn the judge's order and release him under certain conditions as he awaited trial.

Manafort is one of four Trump campaign aides to have been charged in Mueller's investigation. Three others -- George Papadopoulos, Michael Flynn and Rick Gates -- had pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with investigators.

--IANS

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