NY AG files civil fraud suit against Trump

[Ranb]

New York attorney general files civil fraud lawsuit against Trump, some of his children and his business

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/21/poli...eneral-letitia-james-fraud-lawsuit/index.html

The New York state attorney general filed a sweeping lawsuit Wednesday against former President Donald Trump, three of his adult children and the Trump Organization, alleging they were involved in an expansive fraud lasting over a decade that the former President used to enrich himself.

In the more than 200-page lawsuit, Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, alleges the fraud touched all aspects of the Trump business, including its properties and golf courses. According to the lawsuit, the Trump Organization deceived lenders, insurers and tax authorities by inflating the value of his properties using misleading appraisals.

“These acts of fraud and misrepresentation were similar in nature, were committed by upper management at the Trump Organization as part of a common endeavor for each annual Statement, and were approved at the highest levels of the Trump Organization – including by Mr. Trump himself,” the lawsuit states.

They're seeking $250 million. I thought it would have been more than that.

Ranb

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

They're seeking $250 million. I thought it would have been more than that.

What damages are being sought in the October trial?

 

[plague311]

I think the most important part from this is:

James said she believes state and criminal laws may have been violated and referred the matter to the US attorney's office for the Southern District of New York and the Internal Revenue Service.

(I think she meant state and federal, might be a mess-up on CNN's part, as shocking as that might be).

I'm sure the attorney's office for the SDNY has been looking into it already, but any criminal referral is bound to put a little giddy-up in their case. Especially if it comes part and parcel with evidence of crimes already.

They're seeking $250 million. I thought it would have been more than that.

Ranb

Well that and...

to permanently bar Trump and the children named in the lawsuit from serving as the director of a business registered in New York state. She is also seeking to cancel the Trump Organization's corporate certificate, which, if granted by a judge, could effectively force the company to cease operations in New York state.

That's a huge blow I would think. He has Trump tower and a **** ton of rental properties in NY if I remember right. That would be pretty devastating.

 

[alfaniner]

New York attorney general files civil fraud lawsuit against Trump, some of his children and his business

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/21/poli...eneral-letitia-james-fraud-lawsuit/index.html



They're seeking $250 million. I thought it would have been more than that.

Ranb

Just listening to all those charges gave me a semi, or at least made me smile, assuming some or all will stick.

I think there's a separate conclusion in civil suits that can award punitive damages. Not mentioned here, though.

 

[Craig4]

The AG is also going after the organization's ability to operate as a business. That's even more damaging than the fine.

 

[Stacyhs]

I'm thrilled. Now for the state and federal criminal charges!

I hope the Danny Downers who kept insisting he would never be charged will now stop.

On cue as expected from Trump cultists:

New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, the conference chair:

"Tish James has been on a deranged anti-Trump mission since she became Attorney General. This is just another chapter of an illegitimate witch hunt."

Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.), who's running for New York governor, said, "It's more about her trying to fulfill a campaign promise than anything else."

Rep. Jim Banks, the Republican Study Committee chair who's vying for majority whip next year,...
"House Republicans will hold partisan actors posing as law-enforcement agents accountable for abusing their power when we retake the majority," Banks said in a statement, calling James' investigation an "illegitimate fishing expedition."

Even more predictable is Trump's response:

"She is a failed AG whose lack of talent in the fight against crime is causing record numbers of people and companies to flee New York,’ former president says"
The former president responded on Truth Social, writing, “another Witch Hunt by a racist Attorney General, Letitia James, who failed in her run for Governor, getting almost zero support from the public, and now is doing poorly against Law & Order AG candidate, highly respected Michael Henry.

“I never thought this case would be brought - until I saw her really bad poll numbers. She is a fraud who campaigned on a ‘get Trump’ platform, despite the fact that the city is one of the crime and murder disasters of the world under her watch!” he added.

“Attorney General Letitia ‘Peekaboo’ James, a total crime fighting disaster in New York, is spending all of her time fighting for very powerful and well-represented banks and insurance companies, who were fully paid, made a lot of money, and never had a complaint about me, instead of fighting murder and violent crime, which is killing New York State.”

“She is a failed AG whose lack of talent in the fight against crime is causing record numbers of people and companies to flee New York. Bye, bye!” he wrote.

 

[Hercules56]

I'm not interested until I see criminal charges

 

[Bob001]

I'm not interested until I see criminal charges

A judgment or settlement could shut down his business and cost him hundreds of millions of dollars in fines. His lenders might call in their outstanding loans. The impact could be more severe than a criminal conviction resulting in probation. We all know that nobody is going to send a former President to prison.

 

[Warp12]

New York AG Trump lawsuit a 'political hit job' driven by left's desire to 'punish' him: Bill Barr
https://www.foxnews.com/media/new-y...cal-hit-job-lefts-desire-punish-him-bill-barr

Former Attorney General Bill Barr dismissed the lawsuit filed by the New York attorney general against former President Donald Trump and his children as a "political hit job," telling Fox News it is yet another symptom of "Trump derangement syndrome" and the left's desire to "punish" Trump.

"It’s hard for me not to conclude it’s a political hit job," Barr said Wednesday on "America Reports." "This is a woman who campaigned for office promising she was going to go after Trump, which I think is a tremendous abuse of office to go head-hunting and targeting individuals."

Barr knows what's up. But around here, nothing is ever politically-motivated when it comes to going after Trump.

 

[Brainster]

Keep in mind when reading this that I am anti-Trump, and want him gone from politics.

Could be something, could be nothing. I do note that none of the entities supposedly defrauded by Trump have sued him themselves, which is certainly interesting. As far as the appraisal BS goes, be serious. No lender relies on a borrower's appraisal (this was the business I worked in for 40 years), any good loan officer can do a desk valuation in 20 minutes that won't be more than 10% off the $10,000 appraisal that an MAI will provide.

Ditto with the tax assessors. They generally know what they are doing and of course there is always the assessed valuation versus the market valuation amusement when dealing with tax assessors. These are somewhat dark waters but suffice to say that big property owners have staff to handle tax appeals and shockingly they always appeal to have their taxes reduced.

On the radio they mentioned two specific cases. In one Trump supposedly overstated the size of his personal apartment by a factor of 3. If the claim is true then Trump's got some 'splaining to do. The second supposedly concerned deed restrictions on Mar-A-Lago that result in it having a lower value than claimed. Too vague to comment on, but again none of his lenders have sued him over these deals.

 

[alfaniner]

Kind of curious as to where Jared DOESN'T fit into all this...

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Kind of curious as to where Jared DOESN'T fit into all this...

Can't find anything saying he works for the Trump Organization. Does he?

 

[slyjoe]

Keep in mind when reading this that I am anti-Trump, and want him gone from politics.

Could be something, could be nothing. I do note that none of the entities supposedly defrauded by Trump have sued him themselves, which is certainly interesting. As far as the appraisal BS goes, be serious. No lender relies on a borrower's appraisal (this was the business I worked in for 40 years), any good loan officer can do a desk valuation in 20 minutes that won't be more than 10% off the $10,000 appraisal that an MAI will provide.
Ditto with the tax assessors. They generally know what they are doing and of course there is always the assessed valuation versus the market valuation amusement when dealing with tax assessors. These are somewhat dark waters but suffice to say that big property owners have staff to handle tax appeals and shockingly they always appeal to have their taxes reduced.

On the radio they mentioned two specific cases. In one Trump supposedly overstated the size of his personal apartment by a factor of 3. If the claim is true then Trump's got some 'splaining to do. The second supposedly concerned deed restrictions on Mar-A-Lago that result in it having a lower value than claimed. Too vague to comment on, but again none of his lenders have sued him over these deals.

Greed by individual bank personnel - see Deutsche Bank.

Why haven't they sued? Every heard of the saying "if you default on 500K you are in trouble; default on 500M and the bank is in trouble." Trump was lying to Mazars and the lenders, but they didn't want his BS publicized because they were a party to it and didn't want to lose other customers.

 

[Norman Alexander]

Keep in mind when reading this that I am anti-Trump, and want him gone from politics.

Could be something, could be nothing. I do note that none of the entities supposedly defrauded by Trump have sued him themselves, which is certainly interesting. As far as the appraisal BS goes, be serious. No lender relies on a borrower's appraisal (this was the business I worked in for 40 years), any good loan officer can do a desk valuation in 20 minutes that won't be more than 10% off the $10,000 appraisal that an MAI will provide.

Ditto with the tax assessors. They generally know what they are doing and of course there is always the assessed valuation versus the market valuation amusement when dealing with tax assessors. These are somewhat dark waters but suffice to say that big property owners have staff to handle tax appeals and shockingly they always appeal to have their taxes reduced.

On the radio they mentioned two specific cases. In one Trump supposedly overstated the size of his personal apartment by a factor of 3. If the claim is true then Trump's got some 'splaining to do. The second supposedly concerned deed restrictions on Mar-A-Lago that result in it having a lower value than claimed. Too vague to comment on, but again none of his lenders have sued him over these deals.

If you were fronting a shadowy organisation that wanted to launder their ill-gotten gains into the USA, how easy would it be to lend the loot to some front guy who has inflated the value of his properties. Does that not become collateral for profit-taking inside the USA? And the higher the dodgy valuation the merrier, because more loot can be "loaned". Just give the front guy a tip or two...perhaps a credit card to pay for his red ties and golf carts?

 

[a_unique_person]

Greed by individual bank personnel - see Deutsche Bank.

Why haven't they sued? Every heard of the saying "if you default on 500K you are in trouble; default on 500M and the bank is in trouble." Trump was lying to Mazars and the lenders, but they didn't want his BS publicized because they were a party to it and didn't want to lose other customers.

I worked for an Insurance company. They even let staff get away with fraud and just fired them. Bad for the image to go public.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Banks didn't bother to investigate sub-prime mortgage derivatives; what makes anyone think they bother to investigate what Trump tells them, especially given how hard it is to get any information from Trump.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

This lawsuit is also doing the work for the IRS.

 

[Brainster]

Slate has more detail and I gotta say the case is sounding thinner and thinner. On the property tax issue:

Understating the value of Trump International Hotel and Tower in Las Vegas in order to pay less in property taxes. (“We cleaned their clock,” an outside tax counsel is said to have told Eric Trump after a hearing in which an appraiser paid by the Trump Organization painted a dim picture of the tower’s financial outlook for Clark County officials.)

Like I said, pretty typical for commercial real estate; if you aren't appealing your assessment you're an idiot, a point Slate acknowledges later:

Cheating on one’s taxes is not a crime generally viewed with sympathy by the public, but on that front, one individual in the commercial real estate business that Slate contacted noted that striving for lowball appraisals for tax purposes—while painting a pretty picture for lenders and investors—is something that “everyone” does. (This person did acknowledge that one can, of course, go “too far” in doing so.)

As expected the supposed "victim" of the fraud is Deutsche Bank, but:

Nor, it would appear from the suit, did Trump ever default on the terms he arranged with the bank.

Here's another one that raised an eyebrow here:

Playing games with estimates of the value of Trump-owned land in New York state and at Mar-a-Lago that he promised not to develop in exchange for a “conservation easement” tax break. In the former case, Trump is accused of receiving tax credits that would have been much smaller if they had been valued accurately; in the latter, he’s accused of promising the government that he wouldn’t develop certain land—and then estimating, in personal statements given to financial institutions, what it’d be worth if he did develop it. (One example of the number fudging going on: In the process of considering internally whether to donate the land, Trump et al. are said to have been told by an independent appraiser that a certain number of lots, which the Trumps had estimated in their own financial statements as being worth $23 million each, were actually worth about $700,000 apiece.)

I guarantee the land in question was not collateral for any loans, because the conservation easements would have come up as a Schedule B item (exceptions to clear title). This is also related to the Deutsche Bank loans. But again according to Slate:

While the examples of inflated valuations might be embarrassing to Trump personally, the main “victim” as outlined in the suit is Deutsche Bank, whose personal-wealth division is portrayed as eager to win Trump’s business but not so eager to verify or double check any of the financial claims made on his behalf by his representatives.

It's going to be hard to argue then that the misrepresentations were material.

This (at the end) strikes me as the most intriguing:

Flat-out lying to a company that provided Trump organizations with surety bonds and another company that insured the organizations against litigation risks about whether Trump’s financial statements had been prepared by third parties (they hadn’t been) and whether he and his businesses were the subject of any ongoing governmental litigation that could lead to investigations (they were).

 

[The Great Zaganza]

"if everyone does it it's not a crime" is not as great a defense as you think.

 

[Susheel]

Slate has more detail and I gotta say the case is sounding thinner and thinner. On the property tax issue:



Like I said, pretty typical for commercial real estate; if you aren't appealing your assessment you're an idiot, a point Slate acknowledges later:



As expected the supposed "victim" of the fraud is Deutsche Bank, but:



Here's another one that raised an eyebrow here:



I guarantee the land in question was not collateral for any loans, because the conservation easements would have come up as a Schedule B item (exceptions to clear title). This is also related to the Deutsche Bank loans. But again according to Slate:



It's going to be hard to argue then that the misrepresentations were material.

This (at the end) strikes me as the most intriguing:

I am sure your apologetics will provide some solace to the fact that your guy lost...but I will go with the idea that the AG, who I believe is objectively more knowledgeable in these matters, has all her ducks in a row.