One of the leading topics in the American and British press is the beginning of the deliberations of the jury trial in the New York fraud case against former US President Donald Trump.
After seven weeks of legal arguments and testimony, the first of the cases against the former American president is now in the hands of a jury, and this is the final stage of the landmark trial, writes the "New York Times".
Trump's fate is now in the hands of these 12 New York jurors who will decide whether to denounce him as a criminal, the publication commented. The decision, which has the potential to transform the country's legal and political landscape, could take them hours, days or even weeks, it added.
Trump is accused of orchestrating a cash-for-hush scheme in 2016 to Stormy Daniels - buying her silence about an alleged intimate relationship with him years earlier, then reimbursing his former lawyer Michael Cohen the amount he paid Daniels was reported in the Washington Post.
The allegations of falsifying business documents are based on an allegation that Trump misclassified payments to Cohen as a legal expense rather than an expense for his presidential campaign, the publication noted.
The judge in the case, Juan Murchan, spent about an hour instructing jurors on how to consider the charges against the former president, on the specifics of the law and on how they should consider the testimony and evidence presented to them, according to the " Guardian".
Jurors must decide whether or not Trump is guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business documents, the paper said. They must also decide whether he did so in furtherance of violating another law, which is at the heart of prosecutors' claims that it is a felony and not an administrative offense, the publication added.
Mrchan told jurors that in order to reach a guilty verdict, they must unanimously decide that Trump committed the forgeries to cover up another illegal act of his - but added that they need not agree and also an opinion about which other law the former president broke, notes “Guardian”. That leaves open the possibility that some jurors could decide that he is guilty of violating tax laws, while others could decide that Trump violated state or federal campaign finance laws, thus finding him guilty without having consensus on all charges, the newspaper commented.
However, how likely it is that Trump will be convicted and whether he will become the first US president to serve a prison sentence, asks the British "Telegraph".
The publication quoted John Coffey of Columbia Law University as predicting that a jury in New York is highly likely to find the former president guilty, noting the high fines imposed on him in fraud and defamation cases.
However, the expert does not think it is very likely that Trump will serve time in prison, noting that he is 77 years old and has a clean criminal record.