On Friday, a Manhattan court dealt Donald Trump another blow by rejecting his “borderline frivolous” attempt to have New York’s $250 million fraud case against him, which aims to move his commercial empire out of state, dismissed. Nine pages long, Justice Arthur Engoron of the New York Supreme Court put Attorney General Letitia James’ lawsuit on schedule for an early October trial.
Trump’s attorneys have filed what James calls repeatedly rejected legal arguments, including the assertion that James’ three-year investigation of his business and the subsequent lawsuit is a “witch hunt,” but James has refrained from penalizing them as he had warned earlier in the week.
James, a Democrat, ran for attorney general in 2018 on a platform of investigating and prosecuting fraud accusations against the Trump Organization, the president’s golf resort and real estate corporation, which is based in Manhattan.
Even though Trump has repeatedly used the “witch hunt” defense to try to get the attorney general’s investigative subpoenas dropped, Engoron ruled on Friday that the argument is worthless since it has previously been rejected by his court, the state’s highest court, and a federal judge last year.
Trump’s assertions that James has the standing or competence to sue him and that the attorney general’s charges are too old to prosecute were also rejected by Engoron, who ruled against the petition to dismiss. After reading both sides’ arguments, the judge felt like he was experiencing “Deja vu all over again,” in the words of baseball great Lawrence Peter (“Yogi”) Berra.
The court also found Trump’s contention that disclaimers attached to the allegedly bogus financial statements given to potential lenders exonerated him from fraud to be “wholly unconvincing.” These disclaimers effectively warned lenders not to rely on Trump’s calculations. The court finished off by criticizing Ivanka Trump, who is named as a defendant along with her brothers Eric Trump and Donald Trump, Jr., who are both vice presidents at their father’s firm and have been in the past.
Ivanka Trump’s move to dismiss the complaint was filed separately, and Engoron’s rejection of it implied that she had lied during a deposition required by the court last year, in which she was questioned by attorneys for James. Since Ivanka Trump is no longer involved with her father’s business and has not been accused of fabricating or knowing about the falsification of any corporate business records, she argued that she should be dismissed from the lawsuit.
Engoron said that the attorney general’s evidence shows that Ivanka Trump has had extensive dealings with her father’s longtime preferred lender, Deutsche Bank, over the course of several years. Among the projects I worked on with them were Trump National Doral Golf Course in Miami and the Old Post Office in Washington, DC, where I oversaw finance and loan compliance.
“The record establishes that Ms. Trump participated far more in securing the loans than just passively receiving emails,” Engoron wrote. “In her deposition, Ms. Trump testified that she does not understand statements of financial condition and that she does not even know if they would include all assets and liabilities,” the judge wrote.
This was despite her talking to Deutsche Bank about SFCs, he noted. Moreover, Ivanka Trump argued that she was immune to legal responsibility in the attorney general’s complaint, but this, too, is not the case, as Engoron detailed. It is clear from the evidence presented that Ms. Trump reaped over $10 million from the sale of the Old Post Office, the court said.
Trump may have to give up some of the gains from the sale of the Old Post Office if the attorney general’s allegations that the RFP was based on false representations about her value are true, as he claimed in his legal brief. “Once again, Donald Trump‘s attempts to evade the law have been rejected,” James said in a statement.
We filed suit against Mr. Trump because he committed massive financial fraud over many years in order to enrich himself at the expense of others and circumvent the law. The judgment made today shows that Donald Trump is accountable for his acts in court.
Legal counsel for Trump, Alina Habba, expressed optimism that their appeal will be thoroughly reviewed. A member of the second Trump family who was asked for comment did not immediately get back to us.
Last Lines
The $250 million fraud case brought against Donald Trump by the state of New York, which seeks to relocate his business empire out of state, was rejected by a Manhattan judge on Friday, dealing him another blow. Justice Arthur Engoron of the New York Supreme Court issued a nine-page opinion scheduling the trial of Attorney General Letitia James’ complaint for early October.
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