Manafort trial continues with luxury suits, Trump tweets

Alexandria, Virginia — 

Prosecutors on Wednesday sought for instance Paul Manafort’s costly style in fits, automobiles and actual property – paid for by wire transfers from offshore accounts – whereas President Donald Trump took to Twitter to hold forth on the trial of his former marketing campaign chairman and to assault particular counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

Prosecutors additionally raised the prospect that Manafort’s longtime deputy, Rick Gates, wouldn’t be known as as a witness, doubtlessly complicating the protection’s makes an attempt to deflect blame from Manafort to Gates.

RELATED: Paul Manafort trial tracker

As Mueller’s crew made its case towards Manafort within the courtroom, the President took to Twitter to name the prosecution a “hoax” and declare that Manafort had labored for his marketing campaign “for a very short time.”

Manafort’s trial is the primary case Mueller’s crew has taken earlier than a jury, the place they’re charging Manafort with 18 counts of violating tax and banking legal guidelines. Manafort has pleaded not responsible to all fees.

Prosecutors have highlighted Manafort’s purchases of actual property, automobiles, a $21,000 watch and a $15,000 jacket “made from an ostrich” of their effort to color him as a lavish spender. Judge T.S. Ellis, nevertheless, has prevented prosecutors from displaying photographs of luxury objects to the jury.

Ellis has repeatedly informed the legal professionals to “hurry up” or “move along” throughout questioning, and Mueller’s crew mentioned Wednesday that they now anticipate to relaxation their case subsequent week. It’s not clear how a lot time the protection crew will take with its case.

The President is paying shut consideration to TV protection of the trial and has his authorized crew giving updates on developments, sources tell NCS, and he started the day by blasting the investigation: “This is a terrible situation and Attorney General Jeff Sessions should stop this Rigged Witch Hunt right now, before it continues to stain our country any further. Bob Mueller is totally conflicted, and his 17 Angry Democrats that are doing his dirty work are a disgrace to USA!”

In a second tweet, Trump wrote: “Paul Manafort worked for Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole and many other highly prominent and respected political leaders. He worked for me for a very short time. Why didn’t government tell me that he was under investigation. These old charges have nothing to do with Collusion – a Hoax!”

Trump despatched one more tweet late Wednesday morning about Manafort by asking who was treated worse, his former marketing campaign chief or Al Capone.

“Looking back on history, who was treated worse, Alfonse Capone, legendary mob boss, killer and ‘Public Enemy Number One,’ or Paul Manafort, political operative & Reagan/Dole darling, now serving solitary confinement – although convicted of nothing? Where is the Russian Collusion?” Trump tweeted.

Prosecutor Uzo Asonye opened the door Wednesday to the concept Mueller’s crew won’t name Gates as a witness.

“He may testify in this case, he may not,” Asonye mentioned. Asonye added that his crew is all the time re-evaluating whether or not to name a witness, relying on how the case goes and timing.

Ellis tried to rush prosecutors alongside all day as they walked the jury by means of paperwork present in Manafort’s house with FBI agent Matthew Mikuska.

“If you’re to call Mr. Gates, this is a waste of time,” Ellis mentioned, referring to Mikuska’s testimony a few memo titled “Gates agenda” that seemed to be a technique memo from 2013.

During the back-and-forth about whether or not Gates will testify, Ellis famous the flurry of journalists leaving the courtroom, saying they “scurried out of here like rats out of a sinking ship.”

Ellis additionally made his personal connection to the bigger Russian investigation with an attention-grabbing comparability of “oligarchs” to distinguished US political donors.

Before the jury entered the room on Wednesday, Ellis urged either side to keep away from utilizing the time period “oligarch” when describing Manafort’s highly effective patrons in Ukraine. Ellis informed Mueller’s crew to not give jurors the implication that oligarchs had been criminals.

In making his level, Ellis, who is named a typically colourful decide, even invoked two distinguished US political donors.

“Mr. Soros would then be an oligarch … so would Mr. Koch … but we wouldn’t use that term,” Ellis mentioned, referring to Democratic megadonor George Soros and one of many billionaire Koch brothers, whose influential community helps Republican candidates.

As prosecutors laid out their case Wednesday, Ellis prevented the jury from seeing photographs of the luxury clothes, watch and different objects Manafort allegedly purchased with hidden Ukrainian consulting cash.

“Mr. Manafort is not on trial for having a lavish lifestyle,” Ellis mentioned with the jury out of the room. Ellis has beforehand expressed his distaste for the particular counsel’s method to the case.

The photographs of clothes with “Alan Couture” and “House of Bijan” labels are a part of the prosecutors’ trove of proof. Instead of displaying photos of the “closets full” of high-end clothes that Mikuska described on the stand, Ellis, Asonye and Mikuska have solely talked in regards to the objects.

Manhattan clothier Maximillian Katzman informed the jury that Manafort was the one consumer of high-end males’s boutique Alan Couture to pay with worldwide wire transfers.

“You will be receiving an email for the amount due from Leviathan,” which is a international shell firm of Manafort’s, Manafort wrote to the clothes boutique in a single e-mail.

Katzman described a number of invoices for Manafort from his father’s retailer, Alan Couture, the place he was a supervisor. Manafort had purchased 4 fits and two pairs of trousers for $15,195, in response to one bill, for example, Katzman mentioned.

Manafort spent on common $100,000 with the shop yearly from 2010 to 2012. In 2013, he spent $443,160 on the retailer, Katzman mentioned.

After he mentioned Manafort was an vital consumer, Ellis requested Katzman if all of Alan Couture’s shoppers had been vital.

“I don’t want to answer that,” Katzman mentioned, to a lot laughter within the courtroom.

Ronald Wall, a monetary govt at House of Bijan, a high-end style retailer in Beverly Hills, described Manafort as “a very good customer.”

Daniel Opsut, a monetary officer at a Mercedes-Benz dealership in Virginia, testified that Manafort’s household purchased and leased costly automobiles from the luxury dealership and paid from Manafort’s offshore accounts in Cyprus.

Paying from offshore accounts is “not common, but it’s not unheard-of,” Opsut mentioned.

Steve Jacobson, a longtime building contractor who labored on private tasks for the Manaforts within the Hamptons and New York, informed the jury that Manafort had paid his firm principally by means of worldwide wire transfers for hundreds of thousands of {dollars}’ value of house renovations.

One incoming wire switch in 2010 paid for house enhancements value $124,000 and got here from a shell firm Manafort allegedly used known as Global Highway Limited. “This matches up with the invoice I sent to him,” Jacobson testified.

Mikuska, the FBI agent who raided Manafort’s house final yr, testified that he and different brokers had gathered outdoors Manafort’s door shortly after 6 a.m., then knocked on three separate events and introduced that the FBI was there to execute a search warrant.

When no person answered the door, the brokers used a key they already had and entered the condominium, Mikuska mentioned. When they walked in, they noticed Manafort standing close by. The agent testified he didn’t understand how the FBI brokers had the important thing.

Some information studies following the July 2017 search advised that it was a “no-knock raid,” however Mikuska disputed that notion.

Mikuska informed the jury that Manafort’s title was on a number of paperwork discovered displaying hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in mortgage agreements and wire switch invoices.

His testimony was the primary second within the trial the place prosecutors have gotten to the meat of their argument – that Manafort knowingly signed a number of sorts of false monetary paperwork.

One doc seized through the search was a mortgage settlement with Banc of California with Manafort listed because the applicant. This financial institution is among the many monetary establishments victimized by Manafort’s alleged financial institution fraud.

Another doc seems to point out a wire switch with Manafort’s title on it with a $3 million stability. That doc mentioned “wire into our account,” Mikuska mentioned.

Political TV advert advisor Daniel Rabin took the stand because the prosecution’s first witness of the day.

He spoke about his work in Ukraine with Manafort for former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his political social gathering, the Party of Regions. Rabin beforehand labored alongside Manafort and Tad Devine, who testified Tuesday about Manafort’s work in Ukraine.

Prosecutor Greg Andres mentioned the witnesses are supposed to set up for the jury the extent of the work Manafort did in Ukraine, up till Yanukovych’s ouster in 2014. Yanukovych has since fled to Russia.

Defense lawyer Richard Westling requested Rabin whom he despatched invoices to at Manafort’s firm for his Ukrainian TV advert work. Rabin mentioned they first went to an assistant on the firm, then to Gates.

“Sounds like he handled a lot of logistics and business issues,” Westling mentioned.

“That’s correct,” Rabin responded.