WASHINGTON (AP) — A witness in the criminal case against Donald Trump over the hoarding of classified documents retracted “prior false testimony” after switching lawyers last month and provided new information that implicated the former president, the Justice Department said Tuesday.

The statements from the witness, a Trump staffer identified in court papers as the director of information technology at Mar-a-Lago, was presented to prosecutors weeks before special counsel Jack Smith secured an updated indictment accusing Trump and two others in a plot to delete surveillance video at the Florida property.

Prosecutors said in a court filing Tuesday that the witness told a grand jury in Washington in March that he could not recall any conversations about the security footage

But in July, after being warned by prosecutors that he was a target of the investigation and after being advised that his lawyer might have a conflict of interest because of his representation of others in the probe, the witness received a new attorney from the federal defender’s office and provided the Justice Department with information that helped form the basis of the revised indictment against Trump, his valet Walt Nauta and a third defendant, Carlos De Oliveira, the court filing says.

Prosecutors described the witness interaction in a filing that seeks a hearing in Florida about potential conflicts of interest involving the defense lawyer, Stanley Woodward, who also represents Nauta. Woodward declined to comment Tuesday to The Associated Press.

“The target letter to Trump Employee 4 crystallized a conflict of interest arising from Mr. Woodward’s concurrent representation of Trump Employee 4 and Nauta,” prosecutors wrote.

They added: “Advising Trump Employee 4 to correct his sworn testimony would result in testimony incriminating Mr. Woodward’s other client, Nauta; but permitting Trump Employee 4’s false testimony to stand uncorrected would leave Trump Employee 4 exposed to criminal charges for perjury.”

In the filing, the Justice Department also sought to explain its use of grand juries in both Washington and Florida, where charges were ultimately filed. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Florida judge presiding over the case, had earlier asked about the legal propriety of using grand juries in both districts.

Prosecutors said they continued using the Washington grand jury even after charges were filed in Florida for the express purpose of investigating potential false statements by witnesses in Washington. The Washington grand jury completed its term last week, they said.

A trial has been set for May 20, 2024, in the classified documents case. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

Trump is facing another prosecution by Smith, over efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, as well as a criminal case in Georgia over attempts to subvert that state’s vote and another in New York in connection with hush money payments to a porn actor.

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FORT PIERCE, Fla. (AP) — The property manager of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate and an aide to the former president are due back in federal court in Florida on Thursday to face charges in the case accusing Trump of illegally hoarding classified documents at his resort after leaving the White House.

Carlos De Oliveira, the property manager, is scheduled to be arraigned in Fort Pierce before a magistrate judge on charges including conspiracy to obstruct justice in the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith. De Oliveira made an initial appearance in court late last month but didn’t enter a plea because he hadn’t yet found a Florida-based attorney to represent him, as is required under court rules.

Walt Nauta, a Trump aide, is expected to enter a plea for a second time in the case — this time on a new indictment with additional charges recently handed down. Nauta pleaded not guilty last month after the case was first brought in June.

The former president was also scheduled to be arraigned Thursday on the new indictment, which includes allegations that Trump schemed with De Oliveira and Nauta to try to delete Mar-a-Lago security footage sought by investigators.

But Trump filed court papers last week saying that he is not guilty of the charges and waived his right to appear at the hearing. The indictment includes new counts of obstruction and willful retention of national defense information.

Trump has pleaded not guilty to criminal charges in three different cases this year as he tries to reclaim the White House in 2024. The Republican has denied any wrongdoing and has characterized all the cases against him as politically motivated.

Trump pleaded not guilty in Washington’s federal court last week in a second case brought by Smith that accuses Trump of conspiring with allies to overturn his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

The updated indictment in the documents case centers on surveillance footage at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach. Trump is alleged to have asked for the footage to be deleted after FBI and Justice Department investigators visited in June 2022 to collect classified documents he took with him after leaving the White House.

Video from Mar-a-Lago would ultimately become vital to the government’s case because, prosecutors said, it shows Nauta moving boxes in and out of a storage room — an act alleged to have been done at Trump’s direction and in an effort to hide records not only from investigators but also from Trump’s own lawyers.

Days after the Justice Department sent a subpoena for video footage at Mar-a-Lago to the Trump Organization in June 2022, prosecutors say, De Oliveira asked an information technology staffer how long the server retained footage and told the employee “the boss” wanted it deleted. When the employee said he didn’t believe he was able to do that, De Oliveira insisted the “boss” wanted it done, asking, “What are we going to do?”

Prosecutors allege that De Oliveira later lied in interviews with investigators, falsely claiming that he hadn’t even seen boxes moved into Mar-a-Lago after Trump left the White House.

De Oliveira’s attorney, John Irving, told reporters after the last hearing that he looks forward to seeing what potential evidence the Justice Department has, and declined to comment about whether De Oliveira has been asked to testify against Trump.

The new indictment also charges Trump with illegally holding on to a document he’s alleged to have shown off to visitors in New Jersey.

Trump is charged separately in New York state court with falsifying business records related to hush money payments made during the 2016 election.

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MIAMI (AP) — Lawyers for former President Donald Trump say they agreed with federal prosecutors to delay to next week a pretrial hearing to discuss how classified information is handled in court as he faces federal charges that he illegally hoarded classifed documents at his Florida estate.

The hearing to discuss the Classified Information Procedures Act had previously been set for Friday. But an attorney for Trump’s valet Walt Nauta, who was charged alongside the former president, said he has another bench trial this week in Washington preventing him from appearing Friday in South Florida.

The attorneys said in their filing that they can appear at the pretrial conference to go over the 1980 law on July 18, adding they had also checked with U.S. attorneys on moving the date.

The judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, still needs to agree to the new date.

Trump and Nauta were charged in a 38-count indictment with conspiring to hide classified documents at Mar-a-Lago from federal investigators. Both men have pleaded not guilty.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing and has slammed the prosecution as an effort to hurt his bid to reclaim the White House in 2024.

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