Daily Mail: ‘I thought she was drunk’: What witness to Trump campaign aide’s alleged battery told police about reporter ‘victim’ he thought was staging ‘a fraudulent slip-and-fall’
Michelle Fields, then of Breitbart News, claimed Donald Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski grabbed her with force when she was trying to ask the candidate a question
She filed a criminal complaint against him for simple battery and police referred the case for prosecution
But Palm Beach County won’t prosecute because video evidence shows Fields invaded Secret Service ‘bubble’ around Trump and touched him first
Lewandowski, they found, ‘reacted and did what he needed to do’ and bruises on Fields’ arm pictured days later were not visible that night
Fields is contemplating filing a civil case against the campaign aide
One witness told police he thought Fields staged ‘a fraudulent slip-and-fall’ and was ‘animated and acting’ – and ‘at first I thought she was drunk
His recollections were more than three weeks old when police interviewed him, but prosecutors considered his statement along with other evidence
Among other inconsistencies, investigators found that Fields began the altercation by leaving the press area, entering the ‘protective bubble’ of Secret Service and staff security surrounding Trump, touching him in the process.
Ellis said Fields told her office that she had never touched Trump, but added: ‘That’s not what we see captured on the video.’
The video evidence shows the Republican front-runner pulling away from her after she makes contact.
The Spellman video was first surfaced by a news outlet called Lead Stories. The technology executive’s police interview came more than three weeks after the March 8 incident.
But he told an officer that a photo in the New York post was shot from the same point of view he had in the ballroom at Trump International Golf Club in Jupiter.
‘I had a straight shot at what was going on,’ he said.
‘From my perspective, I was just looking at her rush him … and then suddenly she makes a dramatic spin and turn that looked like a fraudulent slip-and-fall. I mean, it was just blatant.’
‘It looked so, so – disproportionate, is the right word,’ Spellman says on the video.
‘It was bizarre. And I studied her after, because at first I thought she was drunk.’
Also weighing against Spellman’s account is that he explains why he was watching Fields so closely.
‘I was looking right at her … I also noticed she had jeans on. You don’t get into that club with jeans on,’ he said. ‘So, uh, she looked pretty good in them, by the way.
Recalling the moment he said Fields ‘shoved her phone … right at’ Trump, Spellman said he was ‘surprised that Secret Service let ’em do that – let her do that.’
‘But then seconds later it just – she spun, and it was really animated and acting.
His written statement, obtained by NBC News, said he saw Fields ‘fall back in what appeared to be a disproportionate reaction and a fake action. I did not see from my view any touching. I truly believe her reaction was fraudulent.’
MORE PUBLICITY: The case will likely shine a spotlight on Fields as she prepares to promote her first book, due out in June
Lewandowski claimed, wrongly, after the incident that he had never touched Fields, calling her ‘delusional.’ She has threatened to file a civil lawsuit against him for defamation.
Lewandowski’s attorney, Bradford Cohen, warned Thursday against that course of action as he threw a rhetorical brushback pitch at Fields.
‘I don’t find it to be that good of an idea to file a defamation claim on this kind of case,’ he said on CNN, ‘because it opens up a very large door to your past. It opens up a large door to other things that could be going on.’
It could also open up Trump in particular to a round of cringe-worthy legal discovery in the middle of a presidential campaign.
Cohen said on the Fox News Channel’s ‘On the Record with Greta van Susteren’ that Trump and Lewandowski could file counter-claims against both Fields and her boyfriend Jamie Weinstein.
Weinstein, an editor at The Daily Caller, has been Fields’ most vocal online defender.
Fields, Cohen said on Fox news, ‘called Corey a thug and called Mr. Trump a thug.’
‘The first shot that was heard was from her boyfriend saying Corey is a thug and Mr. Trump is a thug … it just kinda snowballed form there,’ he added.
