New York Supreme Court judge, Arthur Engoron, has ruled that former President Donald Trump and his company committed fraud by deceiving banks and insurance by massively over-valuing his real estate assets and exaggerated his net worth on paper works used to secure financing.
The learned judge ordered that some of the business licenses be reversed as a punishment. This will make it impossible for them to conduct business in New York.
Donald Trump has always insisted that he committed no offence. This court decision has come out before the commencement of a non-jury trial in AG Letitia James court case. The ruling has been one of the strongest evidence to proof otherwise the image of Donald Trump as a shrewd and wealthy real estate tycoon turned politician.
Donald Trump has in past always boasted about his wealth.His company and key leaders in his companies have regularly lied about their financial statements hence benefiting from favorable loan terms as well as low insurance premiums.
The judge ruled in a summary judgement, has only ruled on one claim, there are six others will remain to be decided. Starting October 2, a non-jury trial will commence. After that trial, the judge will decide which punishment to issue. James is seeking $250 million in penalties as well as a ban on Trump not to conduct any business activities in New York which is his home state. The trial will come to conclusion in December according to the judge.
The Trump advocates had asked the judge to throw out the lawsuit which he declined. They argued that James was not allowed to file the case considering that there is no evidence that the public was harmed by Donald Trump’s actions. They also stated that most of the allegations in the lawsuit were barred by the statute of limitations.
Judge Engoron revealed that he had rejected those arguments at the commencement of the case.
James who sued Donald Trump and Trump Organization is a Democrat. Trump had made a habit of inflating the value of his assets such as golf courses and skyscrapers. This padded his bottom line by billions of dollars.
One of the allegations is that Donald Trump claimed that his Trump Tower apartment in Manhattan was approximately three times its actual size and valued the real estate property at $327 million. No property in New York City had every sold close to that price.
Trump further valued Mar-a-Lago at $739 million which was ten times more than its reasonable value. Trump stated that there was no crime committed. He argued that it did not matter what he indicated in the financial statement considering that there was a disclaimer which indicated that the documents should not be trusted.
“Do you know the banks were fully paid? Do you know the banks made a lot of money?” Trump testified.
“Do you know I don’t believe I ever got even a default notice, and even during COVID, the banks were all paid? And yet you’re suing on behalf of banks, I guess. It’s crazy. The whole case is crazy.”
The judge revealed that the disclaimer on the financial documents “makes abundantly clear that Mr. Trump was fully responsible for the information contained within” them and that “allowing blanket disclaimers to insulate liars from liability would completely undercut” the “important function” that such statements serve “in the real world.”
This is just one of the cases facing Donald Trump as he campaigns to return to White House in 2024. For the last 6 months he has been indicted on four occasions. He was accused in Washington D.C. and Georgia. He was also indicted in New York for hush money paid on his behalf.
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Last year, the Trump Organization was convicted of tax fraud for helping business executives dodge taxes on luxury apartments and luxury motor vehicles. As a result Trump Organization was fined $1.6 million.
James has asked the judge to ban Donald Trump and his eldest three children from ever running a company based in New York. James started looking into Donald Trump’s business practices in March 2019. This was after Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen testified before Congress in court that his wealth was exaggerated in financial documents submitted to Deutsche Bank when he was attempting to obtain finances to purchase Buffalo Bills.
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