Donald Trump, his eldest son, and his associates have been found guilty by a New York judge of intentionally committing financial fraud over a 10-year period and ordered to pay more than $350 million.
“The fraud discovered here jumps off the page and shocks the conscience,” Judge Arthur Engoron said in his ruling. In a devastating blow to the former president, who had built a successful reputation as a real estate developer, Mr. Engoron ordered Mr. Trump and two other executives to serve as officers or directors of any company or organization in New York. was banned for three years. His sons, Eric Trump Jr. and Donald Trump Jr., were suspended for two years.
The three-month hearing was often a heated affair, with Trump attacking Engoron both in and out of court. The former president’s decision to accept the judgeship appears to have backfired.
“Overall, Donald Trump answered few questions, frequently interjecting long, unrelated speeches on issues far beyond the scope of the trial. He refused to answer questions directly or, in some cases, answered them at all. “His credibility has been seriously damaged by his failure to do so,” Engoron wrote.
In his ruling, Engoron wrote that the defendants’ “facts and expert witnesses simply denied reality, and the defendants failed to accept responsibility or impose internal controls to prevent future recurrence.” He added that the defendant had a “complete lack of contrition and remorse, bordering on pathological.”
The ruling marks the end of a years-long lawsuit. New York Attorney General Letitia James first announced that she would investigate President Trump’s real estate business in 2021.
President Trump has denied all wrongdoing and is likely to appeal the decision.
Prosecutors had asked Engoron to permanently ban $370 million that Trump allegedly lied about his net worth and benefited from low interest rates from lenders.
The ruling follows a pretrial ruling Engoron handed down in September based on documentary evidence. Engoron ruled that Trump misrepresented his net worth to lenders and ordered the revocation of the Trump Organization’s operating certificate, effectively halting its ability to continue doing business in New York.
In Friday’s ruling, Mr. Engoron overturned the original ruling and ordered the appointment of two court monitors to monitor “serious activities that could lead to fraud,” making “revocation of the business license no longer necessary.” Not,” he said.
The actual trial was held to determine whether Trump must pay the fine. Prosecutors must prove that Trump and the other defendants, including his adult sons and former Trump Organization executives Allen Weisselberg and Jeff McConney, acted with intent. there were. Forty witnesses testified during the three-month trial.
Prosecutors alleged that Mr. Trump lied on government financial statements to obtain better loans from lenders. One of the most striking examples in the case concerns President Trump’s triplex apartment in Trump Tower, which records show was reported to be 30,000 square feet, but 1. It was nearly 11,000 square feet.
The court also found that President Trump overvalued the Seven Springs property in Westchester County, New York, and that the property had development potential despite local residents blocking Trump’s real estate plans. The court heard that the lender had been informed that there was. Trump also appraised several rent-stabilized apartments at Trump Park Avenue condominiums at market value.
Trump’s team tried to argue that the valuation contained similar provisions and was therefore “worthless,” but the judge rejected that argument.
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His lawyers also blamed the discrepancy on outside advisers and argued it was an accounting error, but the discrepancy had been going on for years and was inconsistent with external reviews the company had received.
On stage, Trump claimed that he could judge a building’s value by looking at it. “All you have to do is look at a picture of the building and say, ‘That’s that building,'” Trump said of his office building at 40 Wall Street. “You just look at it and say, ‘This is worth a lot more than $550 million.'”
Engoron had initially indicated he intended to issue a ruling by the end of January, but two developments threw his timeline into disarray.
On January 26, former federal judge Barbara Jones, who serves as the court-appointed monitor overseeing the company’s financial reporting, found “certain deficiencies” in the Trump Organization’s financial reports. said.
Then the New York Times report On February 1, it was announced that Mr. Weisselberg, the former chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, was negotiating a possible plea deal with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. Weisselberg reportedly considered pleading guilty to lying on the stand during his fraud trial in exchange for not testifying in another Trump hush money case being prosecuted by the district attorney’s office. It is said that he was doing so.
After Mr. Engoron asked for clarification about the Times report, lawyers for both sides dismissed the report as irrelevant to the case and asked the judge to hand down the verdict as scheduled.
