A Napa Valley winery employee said that District Attorney Fani Willis paid cash during a visit there with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, CNN reported Tuesday.
The account corroborates the district attorney’s testimony last week that she often paid for expenses in cash and that she and Wade shared costs when they traveled.
The news organization reported that Willis paid about $400 in cash for two bottles of wine and a wine-tasting tour in early 2023. The large cash payment surprised the employee, who was accustomed to customers paying by credit card.
“I ran(g) up the thing and I showed her. I was expecting a credit card quite frankly,” Stan Brody, an estate ambassador for Acumen Wines, told CNN in an interview Monday. “And she says I’ll pay cash. And so that was that. So, then I just put the cash in, made change for her and she was very generous to me.”
At a hearing in Fulton County Superior Court last week. Willis and Wade said that while they were involved in a romantic relationship they traveled to various locales and split the costs roughly evenly.
Willis testified that she sometimes reimbursed Wade in cash for plane tickets and hotels he bought for trips to such locations as Napa Valley, Aruba and Belize. She also said she sometimes paid for activities such as wine tours on the trips.
Bank records which emerged as part of Nathan Wade’s divorce proceeding show he paid $817 for he and Willis to fly to San Francisco and $840 for what appears to be a stay at the DoubleTree hotel in Napa Valley.
The testimony of Wade and Willis last week was in response to motions filed by defendants that seek to disqualify the DA and her entire office from prosecuting the Trump election interference case. The defendants say Willis benefitted financially by contracting with Wade to oversee the case because he used some of the money he earned to pay for the trips.
Neither Willis nor Wade could document the cash reimbursements they said she made to cover costs – a fact noted by defense attorneys who sought to cast doubt on their accounts.
But the CNN report corroborates Willis’ testimony that she paid for activities such as wine tours when they traveled. It also supports for her contention – questioned by defense attorneys – that she keeps large amounts of cash on hand on the advice of her father.
“When I travel, I always take cash,” Willis testified last week.
Brody, the winery employee, told CNN his memory of serving Willis and Wade was jogged by watching their testimony last week. He said he had not spoken with the DA’s office or defense attorneys in the case.
A spokesman for Willis declined to comment.
Ashleigh Merchant, who represents defendant Michael Roman, disclosed the Willis-Wade relationship in the first motion to disqualify them last month. When asked about the CNN report, Merchant said she looks forward to discussing the issues further with the court.
“The district attorney and special prosecutor have a lot to lose if they are disqualified, so it is not surprising that they have fashioned a self-serving defense that cannot be corroborated with any documents or witnesses,” Merchant said.
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