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| credit: P. Bagley, Salt Lake Tribune BC Idonwanna sez: Need bigger Sharpie®! |
Trumpillini's companies, Trump Corp. and Trump Payroll Corp were found guilty of 17 counts of tax fraud by a Manhattan jury. The verdict was delivered in relatively short time indicating that the evidence the companies engaged in tax evasion was clear. The verdicts should give prosecutors seeking to indict the boss for crimes confidence that a jury is willing to convict the former President should the evidence be sufficient beyond a doubt. The Manhattan DA insisted that Trumpillini knew about the long-running scheme in which executives were paid off-the-book perks to reduce their salaries and achieve lower corporate taxes.
The month long trial featured testimony from seven witnesses including Alan Weissleburg, former CFO and Jeffery McConney, former Controller. Both testified that they committed the crimes to enrich themselves, minimizing their motive to benefit the company. Jurors did not accept that defense argument, zeroing in on the falsification of business records by company officials. The Trump Org faces more criminal prosecution, as DA Alvin Bragg told the media that a prosecution looking at the integrity of the Trump Organization financial records is on-going.
Meanwhile™the Mar-a-Lago Papers case continues with a stunning development. After months of Trump's attorneys declaring that all classified documents have been turned over to the government, two more classified documents were found in a West Palm Beach storage facility. The search had been ordered by the chief federal district judge overseeing the grand jury investigating the matter. Trump lawyers hired an independent company to conduct a search which included Trump Tower in New York City and his Bedminster Golf Club in New Jersey. The judge ruled against DOJs request to hold Trump in contempt of court for disobeying the subpoena requiring surrender of all government documents in his possession. Incredibly, the deranged narcissist had the temerity to demand on his digital soap box that all seized documents be returned to him immediately, and then demanded that the Constitution be terminated!
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| credit: M. Wuerker, Politico Wackydoodle axes: Do you do windows? |