Trump knew about tax fraud in his company, says prosecution in closing arguments
Former US president Donald Trump
Prosecutors in the Trump Organization tax fraud asserted on Friday (December 2) that former US president Donald Trump knew about the fraud taking place in the family business. Prosecution also said that not only Trump knew about the fraud, he also sanctioned the manoeuvres that enabled his companies avoid tax in a sweeping 15-year operation.
“Donald Trump is explicitly sanctioning tax fraud. That’s what this document shows,” said Joshua Steinglass, the prosecutor in Manhattan Criminal Court on Friday. “This whole narrative that Donald Trump is blissfully ignorant is just not real.”
Trump's lawyers have taken a stance that the former US president did not know about the fraud taking place in the organisation. Their line of defence is concentrated on the assertion that Allen Weisselberg, a former senior executive in the company, committed the fraud.
"We are here today because of one reason and one reason only - the greed of Allen Weisselberg," said the defence earlier this week. "The purpose of Mr. Weisselberg's crimes was to benefit Mr. Weisselberg."
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Defence lawyer Susan Necheles also said that Donald Bender, an accountant with the firm Mazars USA, did not pay heed to Weisselberg's wrongdoing and chose to stay silent.
On Friday, when the prosecution alleged that Trump knew about the fraud, the defence asked the judge for a mistrial.
“We picked a jury...based on the people’s representations that Donald Trump was not on trial,” said defence lawyer Michael van der Veen, adding that the prosecution has now “made him a co-conspirator.”
The entire matter revolves around the Trump Organization which was charged in July 2021 with paying personal expenses for some executives without reporting the income. They were also compensated as if they were independent contractors, in a 15-year scheme to cheat tax authorities.
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The prosecutors need to prove that Weisselberg and other executives acted as "high managerial agents" of the company when they carried out tax fraud, and that they intended to benefit the company in some way.
(With inputs from agencies)
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