A judge has ruled that Donald Trump committed fraud for years while building the real estate empire that catapulted him to fame and the White House.

Judge has ruled that Donald Trump committed fraud for years while building the real estate empire that catapulted him to fame and the White House.

Judge Arthur Engoron, ruling Tuesday in a civil lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general, found that the former president and his company deceived banks, insurers and others by massively overvaluing his assets and exaggerating his net worth on paperwork used in making deals and securing financing.

      • utopianfiat@lemmy.worldEnglish
        33·
        1 year ago

        I sure hope the Republican donor class is neglecting the rest of the 2024 races for the sake of trying in vain to keep Trump out of prison

      • IDontHavePantsOn@lemm.ee
        15·
        1 year ago

        You reminded me of a video news story from the early 2000s where the news station interviewed a guy, who panhandled while pretending to be a wheelchair bound homeless person in front of Walmart, as a sort of “gotcha” journalism piece. He was totally open and honest about it and was chuckling the entire time. At the end of the piece they asked “so now they we have outed you on tv, how are you going to trick people into giving you money?” He replied, "I’m just going to go over there (while pointing to adjacent stores). “And you think you will get people to give you money?” “Yeah, no one knows who I am and people forget so quickly that it won’t effect me”. (These aren’t exact quotes.)

        In a way Trump does the same thing. Everyone forgets his past actions quickly, blames the outcomes on the other party, and just moves on to different allegations he can spin. There’s so much news surrounding him theres little time to actually interpret his actions, and he can just shift gears to another group of downtrodden citizens to swindle if he pisses his supporters off.

  • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
    1273·
    1 year ago

    So why the hell is this a civil suit rather than a criminal one?? Last I checked, bank fraud, insurance fraud, and other fraud are all illegal crimes that are against the law!

    • El Barto@lemmy.world
      307·
      1 year ago

      Not that I don’t agree with you, but I just want to point out that not all cases of breaking the law are criminal. For example, if you run a red light, a cop won’t throw you in jail for it. You’ll get a fine, though.

      Of course, what Trump did should put him in jail.

      But seeing his empire dismantle must be more devastating to his ego than the possibility of prison.

      • insomniac
        191·
        1 year ago

        Fraud is a crime that can come with jail time though.

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
        171·
        1 year ago

        if you run a red light, a cop won’t throw you in jail for it. You’ll get a fine, though.

        Traffic violations such as that are considered civil offences, not criminal ones. Trump keeps being found guilty of federal crimes in civil courts. There’s no way that someone less rich and powerful would get the same treatment.

    • tryptaminev 🇵🇸 🇺🇦 🇪🇺@feddit.de
      13·
      1 year ago

      I am also confused. Why does the attorney general put forward a civil suit in the first place? Civil court is for parties to seek damages or the other party to do or stop doing actions against contractual obligations.

      Or did Trump defraud the city of New York and it is seeking compensation?

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
        151·
        1 year ago

        Or did Trump defraud the city of New York and it is seeking compensation?

        Yeah, some of the “other fraud” is tax fraud, so in a very real and direct sense, he defrauded New York. Still doesn’t make sense for it to be a civil suit rather than a criminal one, though.

        Must be nice to be rich and powerful enough for your decades of major crimes to count as civil infractions 😮‍💨

        • DarthBueller@lemmy.world
          8·
          1 year ago

          Quite simple. Civil liability standard of proof is preponderance of the evidence, which is far less than the standard of proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt in criminal.

      • Natanael@slrpnk.net
        1·
        1 year ago

        The type of suit depends on the type of law violated and the type of injured party. Civil law vs criminal law, etc.

    • singron@lemmy.worldEnglish
      9·
      1 year ago

      They could potentially bring a related criminal suit later. I’m not an attorney, and there are a lot of specific rules about, but the stakes are lower in a civil case (i.e. no prison) and the burden of proof is easier, so you can more easily prove things or get the defense to admit things in a civil case that can sometimes make a criminal case easier.

      Even if you can’t cite the civil case from the criminal case, just the fact that the civil case ruled one way gives the prosecution confidence to commit to a criminal case and leverage if they negotiate a settlement.

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
        61·
        1 year ago

        Fair enough. I’m gonna be pessimistic in stead of completely dismissive about the possibility of him seeing significant consequences, then 😁

    • proleEnglish
      7·
      1 year ago

      Could be due to the lower threshold for evidence (preponderance vs. beyond a reasonable doubt). Though I would imagine there’s tons of evidence of this since it’s been going on for 4 decades.

    • Alien Nathan Edward@lemm.ee
      4·
      1 year ago

      Answer to the question you asked: what he’s technically accused of here is defrauding someone and the law will err on the side of “making the aggrieved party whole” (forcing him to give back what he stole) in these cases. After all, if someone ran off with all your money today would you be happier if the government hurt that person or if they made that person give it back to you. Someone steals my money no jail sentence is gonna satisfy me as much as being able to pay my mortgage.

      Answer to the question you meant to ask: Takes less evidence to get a civil suit to court, and in the process of prosecuting the civil suit you can get subpoenas for evidence and testimony that can lead to criminal indictments. This is basically getting a foot in the door to look at his taxes, his accounting records and everything else. Wouldn’t be shocked at all if there are criminal indictments on the way.

  • ImFresh3x
    805·
    1 year ago

    Went to Fox News to find this huge story. Scrolled by 7 non stories to find the headline ‘judge announced ruling on trump case’ with a picture of the judge looking black holding a microphone as if she’s some *political activist,” with no mention that he was found guilty of massive decades long fraud.

    • lemmyman@lemmy.world
      28·
      1 year ago

      FYI the photo you’re referring to is of NY Attorney General Letitia James, not the judge. She looks black because she’s black.

        • Cethin@lemmy.zipEnglish
          41·
          1 year ago

          That headline is accurate but not precise. If they wanted to inform people they could use the same number if words and describe what happened better.

          • Nelots@lemm.eeEnglish
            6·
            1 year ago

            I didn’t mean fox’s headline was accurate, I meant the previous commentor’s description of what fox did was accurate. I guess fox was accurate by technicality, but I would consider it misleading more than anything, what with the vague headline and victorious looking Trump.

    • thorbot@lemmy.worldEnglish
      7·
      1 year ago

      Excuse me what the fuck does looking black mean in this context? She is black, of course she looks black…

  • mateomaui@reddthat.comEnglish
    58·
    1 year ago

    hell yeah

    Engoron ordered that some of Trump’s business licenses be rescinded as punishment, making it difficult or impossible for them to do business in New York, and said he would continue to have an independent monitor oversee the Trump Organization’s operations.

      • mateomaui@reddthat.comEnglish
        5·
        1 year ago

        Yes, read it from another post! As far as I can tell the only Trumps who dodged it are Ivanka and Tiffany.

    • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
      9·
      1 year ago

      At this point, who is stupid enough to do business with Trump that would also care if he has a business license?

      And why would Trump even pretend to do legitimate business after finding a donation grift that keeps on giving the more trouble he gets in?

  • Evilcoleslaw@lemmy.world
    351·
    1 year ago

    Oh okay, I was a bit confused at first. This is part of the massive civil case, but these are claims within that case that the judge issued summary judgment for. There are still more claims that will go to trial next week.

  • Nobody@lemmy.worldEnglish
    321·
    1 year ago

    If he had lost in 2016, Trump TV would have stolen Fox’s audience and been the de facto voice of the Republican Party. No indictments. No scrutiny. Hillary would have been in charge during the pandemic and kept the public safe. The Supreme Court would still be a trusted institution (minus Citizens United) running in the political background.

    We would have our nice, stable, boring politics back. Hillary would wear a tan pantsuit, and that would be the headline for the next two weeks.

    • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
      6·
      1 year ago

      Honestly I don’t know about that. I think Trump was a direct product of Romney losing in 2012.

      Sooner or later, the far right was going to take off their masks, and the Republicans were going to show that the extremists hold their leash. It was always going to come to a head like this I think.

      • PRUSSIA_x86@lemmy.world
        2·
        1 year ago

        This has been coming since the 90s. Without external pressure caused by the Soviet Union, infighting was inevitable, and infighting ultimately breeds extremism.

  • scripthook@lemmy.world
    311·
    1 year ago

    And you wonder why he never wanted to release his tax returns. Becoming President put him under the microscope and what he did after the 2020 election was by his own doing. I hope that Trump supporters stick with him if he’s in prison before the 2024 election. It’ll be the easiest election to win. One candidate is in prison for attempting to overturn the last election but claims he can pardon himself. The other is not. Hrmmm which one should you vote for?

    • v_krishna@lemmy.mlEnglish
      20·
      1 year ago

      Crazy part is thanks in no small part to the electoral college it’ll still be a close election in your scenario

        • Gumus@lemmy.world
          5·
          1 year ago

          A lot of people voted for Brexit just to see what happens (because they actually didn’t believe it would go through). Look at how that worked for them…

          • squiblet@kbin.social
            4·
            1 year ago

            The idea of frivolous voting like that is pretty dumb. Or “I’ll vote for this person to shake up the system!” or “as a protest!”

      • InternetUser2012@midwest.social
        41·
        1 year ago

        For sure people will, but a lot less will. Either way, he’s not going to win. That being said, FUCKING VOTE!!! If everyone votes, the right has zero chance. They know it, it’s why they’re doing everything they can to make it harder to vote, and this bullshit gerrymandering they’ve managed to pull off.

  • Hazdaz@lemmy.world
    313·
    1 year ago

    The big questions that no one is asking:

    Why did it take so long to get him for fraud? They specifically mentioned that this was while he was building his real estate empire. He’s been doing that since the 80s. Why the fuck did it take some 4 decades to build up a big enough case against him?! Why wasn’t he previously investigated? Why weren’t any of our useless news agencies digging into his finances? He ran for fucken president, for fucks sakes… why couldn’t all this mess have been avoided if various news departments and law enforcement agencies did their damn jobs.

    The most egregious thing about all this is that if he didn’t run for president, probably none of this criminal activity would ever have really come to light. District attorneys and news rooms across the country would have just let all this slide. Which then makes you wonder - how many other billionaires are there out there who are nearly as corrupt as Trump, but because they don’t lavish the media attention, they keep low and none of us know about them. Why aren’t those people being investigated? Why does it take decades to go after these asswipes and only when they purposefully shine the light on themselves?

      • ____@infosec.pub
        4·
        1 year ago

        What’s especially interesting to me about that is that in certain industries (real estate seems a likely one, insurance is the one I know for certain), other states will ask when granting/renewing licenses whether there has been official action against the licensee and/or a licensed business entity they were an officer/partner of… And decline to issue the same license based on that action.

        Not to say the biz can’t continue in, say, FL, but some significant restructuring of officers and the like may be required. I don’t think business licenses or corp filings ask the same questions, but that may vary by state. In either case, this is a bigger problem for him than “not doing business in NY”

    • blazeknave@lemmy.world
      94·
      1 year ago

      Are you stupid for using your five senses and memory of recent events synthesized by your ability to recognize patterns? No. You’re not stupid.

    • jballsEnglish
      23·
      1 year ago

      For anyone, like me, who didn’t know what a summary judgement was:

      Summary judgment is granted when the facts can be decided upon without needing to go to trial, where the opposing party would lose due to a lack of evidence. If it’s not clear that there is no more evidence, then summary judgment must be denied.

      • DarthBueller@lemmy.world
        6·
        1 year ago

        Fun fact: while the word judgment has accepted spellings in US English with or without an “e” after the “g,” US legal system spelling does not have that flexibility. The correct spelling in legal filings is “judgment.” I say this because you have both and it tickles me.

        • jballsEnglish
          2·
          1 year ago

          Huh, who knew? You think I would’ve noticed it from the two times it copied and pasted correctly.

    • athos77@kbin.social
      6·
      1 year ago

      Isn’t this the case where his lawyers screwed up and failed to file paperwork requesting a jury trial, so the judge got to make the ruling on her own?

  • fne8w2ah@lemmy.worldEnglish
    191·
    1 year ago

    Let covfefe’s house of cards crumble like the small whiny weenie that he is!

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldBEnglish
    15·
    1 year ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    NEW YORK (AP) — A judge has ruled that Donald Trump committed fraud for years while building the real estate empire that catapulted him to fame and the White House.

    Judge Arthur Engoron, ruling Tuesday in a civil lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general, found that the former president and his company deceived banks, insurers and others by massively overvaluing his assets and exaggerating his net worth on paperwork used in making deals and securing financing.

    The decision, days before the start of a non-jury trial in Attorney General Letitia James’ lawsuit, is the strongest repudiation yet of Trump’s carefully coiffed image as a wealthy and shrewd real estate mogul turned political powerhouse.

    Beyond mere bragging about his riches, Trump, his company and key executives repeatedly lied about them on his annual financial statements, reaping rewards such as favorable loan terms and lower insurance premiums, Engoron found.

    Those tactics crossed a line and violated the law, the judge said, rejecting Trump’s contention that a disclaimer on the financial statements absolved him of any wrongdoing.

    Manhattan prosecutors had looked into bringing a criminal case over the same conduct but declined to do so, leaving James to sue Trump and seek penalties that could disrupt his and his family’s ability to do business in the state.

    The original article contains 345 words, the summary contains 215 words. Saved 38%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!