CARLOS DE OLIVEIRA, an employee of former US president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, is expected to make his first court appearance on charges of scheming to hide security footage from investigators.

The estate’s property manager was added to the federal indictment of Trump and his former valet Walt Nauta last week.

The case alleges a plot to illegally keep top-secret records at the Florida estate and thwart government efforts to retrieve them.

De Oliveira, who faces charges including conspiracy to obstruct justice and lying to investigators, is scheduled to appear before a magistrate judge in Miami today, nearly two months after the former president pleaded not guilty in the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith.

Prosecutors have not alleged security footage was actually deleted or kept from investigators. A lawyer for De Oliveira declined to comment on the allegations last week.

Trump was informed by letter that he is the target of another federal investigation into his efforts to cling to power after he lost the 2020 election.

He has denied any wrongdoing over the Mar-a-Lago security tapes and said they were voluntarily handed over to investigators, posting on his Truth Social platform last week that he was told the tapes were not “deleted in any way, shape or form”.

Nauta has also pleaded not guilty.

US district judge Aileen Cannon had previously scheduled the trial to begin in May and it is unclear whether the addition of De Oliveira to the case may alter the case’s timeline.

The latest indictment, unsealed on Thursday, alleges Trump tried to have security footage deleted after investigators visited in June 2022 to collect classified documents he took with him after he left the White House.

He was already facing dozens of felony counts — including willful retention of notional defence information — stemming from allegations that he mishandled government secrets that as commander-in-chief he was entrusted to protect.

Prosecutors allege De Oliveira lied in interviews with investigators, claiming he had not even seen boxes moved into Mar-a-Lago.