The former financial director of the Trump Organization Allen Weisselberg, the former president's right-hand man and Republican candidate for re-election, was sentenced this Wednesday to five months in prison after pleading guilty last month to perjury charges for lying to investigators and a judge. about Donald Trump's finances.
Judge Laurie Peterson read the sentence at a hearing in Manhattan Criminal Court. The ruling is in line with the punishment Peterson said she would impose at Weisselberg's guilty plea hearing on March 4. After the hearing this Wednesday, the former executive left the court handcuffed and escorted by judicial officials.
It will be the second time that Weisselberg goes to prison for contributing to or hiding irregularities in his former employer's businesses. Aged 76, he spent about three months in New York's infamous Rikers Island prison in 2023 after pleading guilty to participating in a tax fraud scheme developed over 15 years in the Trump Organization. A prison in theory inconceivable for a white-collar criminal, and which continues to produce mournful headlines, the last of which, the sentence to pay 28 million dollars (about 26 million euros) to an inmate who suffered irreversible brain damage in a suicide attempt left unattended for seven minutes by prison officials.
The perjury charges stem from Weisselberg's testimony in the fraud case that New York State Attorney General Letitia James brought against the now-convicted Trump and other executives of Trump's family real estate company for manipulating the securities of properties to deceive banks and insurance companies and thus obtain better conditions on loans and contracts. The case conducted by James' office constitutes one of the two civil trials that Trump has faced in New York since 2023, and in which he has been sentenced to pay $454 million, with interest, after being found guilty in September. past. Trump has appealed the fine. The other civil trial is for defamation against columnist E. Jean Carroll, for which she has paid a bail of 92 million dollars.
Weisselberg's new conviction comes just days before Trump goes on trial, starting Monday, for paying a $130,000 bribe to porn actress Stormy Daniels.
Weisselberg testified at trial last October 10 that he had nothing to do with the incorrect valuation of the luxury penthouse of Trump in the tower that bears his name, in Manhattan. Trump's 2015 and 2016 returns valued the home at $327 million, based on its stated size of more than 30,000 square feet (2,790 square meters), nearly three times the actual size.
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The office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who brought the charges against Weisselberg, demonstrated that the former financial director of the Trump Organization had collaborated in the makeup of the data of that property, according to the executive's emails shown in the judgment.
The former CFO also admitted to lying about his role in Trump's accounts during two previous depositions to James' office, whose investigation culminated in Judge Arthur Engoron's imposition of the $454 million fine on Trump. He also ordered Weisselberg to pay $1.1 million, including interest, for the same case.
Weisselberg worked for the magnate's family for half a century. His written plea agreement gave no clues about whether he would cooperate with Bragg's office in exposing other possible frauds by his boss. In August 2022 he did reach an agreement with the Prosecutor's Office in exchange for a reduced sentence. A year earlier, the financier had voluntarily surrendered before the Manhattan Prosecutor's Office, in what many considered a firewall to stop investigations into his employer.
The new conviction of the former executive comes just days before Trump goes to trial, starting Monday, for paying a $130,000 bribe to porn actress Stormy Daniels to buy her silence about an extramarital affair before the election. 2016. The meeting supposedly took place in 2006.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover up the dark money deal with the porn star and denies any such relationship with Daniels. The process, also presented by prosecutor Bragg, will become the first criminal trial in history against a former president of the United States. The Republican candidate for re-election in November also faces three other accusations, still without a trial date, stemming from his efforts to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election and his handling of confidential government documents that he improperly took from the White House in January 2021. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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