One year ago Donald J. Trump faced 91 felony counts across four criminal cases enough for an ordinary defendant to brace for years behind bars.

But today Mr. Trump still walks free and is running for president. One of his cases was thrown out.

The U. S. Supreme Court derailed another. A third is delayed indefinitely. And on Friday in his only criminal case that actually made it to trial and scratched his legal Teflon he pulled off one of his most surprising wins yet.

At Mr. Trump’s request and without objection from prosecutors the judge who presided over his criminal trial in Manhattan postponed his sentencing until after the election in which Mr.Trump will square off against Vice President Kamala Harris for the presidency. The judge Juan M. Merchan had previously planned to impose the punishment on Sept.

18 during the heart of the campaign. The decision from a judge who until now had propelled the case relentlessly forward is a surprising validation of the former president’s legal strategy to use his wealth and political status and an assist from the Supreme Court to drag out the case and diminish its impact on his campaign.

The delay all but guarantees that on Election Day Mr. Trump will remain a felon but also a free man.

Mr. Trump who faces up to four years in prison for falsifying records to conceal a sex scandal had sought the delay to buy time to challenge his conviction.

The former president who campaigns on claims that a corrupt court system has victimized him also argued it would be unfair to face sentencing so close to Election Day even though that timing was the result of his own stalling tactics.

But the delay will fuel a competing accusation of unfairness as Mr. Trump’s critics perceive a justice system that treats normal defendants one way and the singular Mr.Trump another. While sentencing delays are routine New York law instructs judges to impose a punishment without unreasonable delay and they often do so within six weeks of conviction.

Mr. Trump has now bought himself six months. To the extent the various delays have been caused by judicial sensitivity to the fact that the former president is campaigning for the White House those courts including the U.S. Supreme Court have furthered the entirely understandable and legitimate impression at this point that the former president is indeed above the law J.Michael Luttig a prominent conservative former U. S. Court of Appeals judge who has been a frequent critic of the former president said on Saturday.

Practically the delay might have little impact. Even if the judge had pushed ahead this month he or an appeals court almost certainly would have postponed the punishment until after the election at least.

An appeals court also could have intervened to overrule the judge and postpone the sentencing. Justice Merchan a veteran judge who vowed before Mr.Trump’s trial to apply the rules of law evenhandedly faced what legal experts called an extremely difficult and even impossible conundrum.

Whatever his decision the judge was bound to alienate wide swaths of the country and invite partisan second guessing for years to come.