Accountant Testifies About Problems With Manafort’s Taxes

Nevertheless, she wrote an email to loan officers saying the income would be received by November of that year.

Prosecutors first brought up discussion of a loan application Manafort submitted related to a New York City property in Soho, a property that both Gates and Manafort said in 2015 was a rental property.

Asonye then asked Laporta whether she believed the transactions were actually foreign loans. He then switched from hiding his income in foreign bank accounts to inflating it so American banks would extend millions in real estate loans to him.

Prosecutors also showed the jury March 2016 emails between Laporta and Gates about fabricating a forgiveness letter on another, $1.5 million loan that Citizen’s Bank needed.

Mr Manafort’s lawyers have previously argued that Mr Gates is the one responsible for the financial charges. U.S. Attorney Uzo Asonye asked Laporta.

The judge in the case, T.S. Ellis, has said that he doesn’t think it will need to go longer than three weeks and would like it to wrap up in two.

“You believed it was false?”

But Ellis reminded prosecutors, “The government has to prove that [Manafort] knew what the requirement was and that he deliberately violated it”.

Kevin Downing, Manafort’s attorney, signaled Friday that his defense strategy might also involve raising questions about whether Manafort in fact had willfully deceived his accountants.

One of Mueller’s leading cases involves 12 Russian military intelligence officers who were accused of hacking and leaking Democratic party documents in an effort to sway the 2016 presidential election.

The trial in that case is expected to begin September 17.

Later, the bank said there was an issue with Manafort’s finances.

She clearly explained, for instance, why Gates asked – and she agreed – that she characterize $900,000 that had been previously reported as income as a loan to DMP International, which Manafort and his wife owned.

The accountant, who testified under a grant of immunity from prosecution, conceded that she knew the action to be “wrong” but feared labeling longtime clients as “liars” while exposing her accounting firm to possible litigation.

Manafort’s trial, being held in USA federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, is the first arising out of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the interactions between Trump associates and Russian officials.

A federal judge warned prosecutors from special counsel Robert Mueller’s team on August 2 that they “can’t prove conspiracy” in the trial of Paul Manafort unless Rick Gates, Manafort’s former business partner, takes the stand.

That investigation remains ongoing, and this week’s financial fraud trial is not tied to collusion.

Earlier Friday, Ayliff testified that Manafort claimed he had no foreign accounts or interests on each of the annual tax forms that he filled out for Ayliff between 2011 and 2014. And when the oligarchs quit paying, Asonye alleged, he filed false documents with banks in order to maintain his cash flow.

‘Money’s coming in fast, ‘ Manafort’s lawyer, Thomas Zehnle, told jurors at the trial’s beginning. Though the charges concern the work he did in Ukraine for Yanukovych, they don’t directly deal with Russia, nor with questions of Trump officials’ dealings with Russian officials.

“None”, Ayliff said, as the exercise was repeated five times.

“Did Rick Gates ever tell you to hide any information from Paul Manafort?”.

The fraudulent loan documents came after Manafort’s political consulting work in the Ukraine had dried up and as he had begun to financially struggle, prosecutors say. “Not sure where that leaves us”.

Asonye walked jurors through Manafort’s tax returns on Friday to back the prosecution’s claim that he hid his foreign accounts and income from US tax authorities.

When prosecutors showed an exhibit displaying the differences in the two accounts, one with $400,000 in income, the other showing $4.45 million, one juror gasped, an observer sitting in the second row in front of the jury box told Reuters.