Justice Arthur Engoron presides over the civil fraud trial of former President Donald Trump and his children at New York State Supreme Court on November 13, 2023 in New York City.
Erin Schaff | Getty Images
Police are investigating a swatting incident at the New York home of the judge set to hear closing arguments later Thursday morning in the business fraud trial of former President Donald Trump.
An email making a threat to the home of Judge Arthur Engoron was sent to a Long Island newspaper, Nassau County Police told CNBC.
The newspaper called cops at 5:30 a.m. to relay the threat, police said.
Officers who responded to Engoron’s home did not find a threat to the judge at the residence.
Swatting is the term used for people making false claims of violence or other incidents at other people’s homes or businesses in an effort to have police swarm those locations.
The Daily Beast news outlet and NBC News reported that a bomb threat had been made against Engoron’s home. But a spokesman for the Nassau PD would not confirm the nature of the threat to CNBC.
The threat comes on the heels of swatting calls made about the homes of the Department of Justice special counsel prosecuting Trump in two federal criminal cases, and the judge presiding over one of those cases in Washington, D.C.
Closing arguments in Trump’s civil fraud trial are set to begin at 10 a.m. in Manhattan Supreme Court. Trump is expected to be in court.
Engoron, his law clerk, and spokesmen for the New York Attorney General’s office and the state court system did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The threat came a day after Engoron denied a request by Trump’s lawyer to allow the former president to give some of the defense’s closing arguments.
The lawyer, Chris Kise, refused to confirm to Engoron that Trump would abide by restrictions the judge had set on what Trump could say during the closing.
Police in Washington, D.C. and Maryland, have said that calls in recent weeks have been made about false claims of violence at the homes of special counsel Jack Smith and Judge Tanya Chutkan.
Chutkan is presiding over the case where Trump is charged with crimes related to his effort to overturn his loss in the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, and his incitement of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot by a mob of his supporters.
This is breaking news. Please check back for updates.