31 May 2024, Washington Post

A New York jury found Donald Trump, former President of United States of America on 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal a hush money payment to an adult-film actress. Trump, the first former U.S. president convicted of a crime, is scheduled to be sentenced on July 11, days before the start of the Republican National Convention.

Anadolu News Agency reported that Ex-US President Donald Trump tore into what he called a “fascist” judicial system Friday, just hours after he was found guilty by a New York jury of 34 state crimes.

Trump, now a convicted felon, went on a meandering and at times contradictory 42-minute diatribe in which he maintained that the “rigged” case was politically motivated by his successor, President Joe Biden, telling his supporters, “If they can do this to me, they can do this to anyone.”

Trump maintained that he would appeal “this scam,” even as he is scheduled to be sentenced by acting New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, who oversaw the case, July 11. Each count of which Trump was convicted carries up to a four-year state prison term, with a a maximum term of 20 years.

The former president did not specify on which grounds he would be appealing, but said his attorneys would object “on many different things.”

Prosecutors alleged that these documents show that Trump intentionally misclassified payments to Cohen that reimbursed him for hush money he gave adult-film actress Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election. The hush money was to keep Daniels quiet about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump in 2006 — an allegation Trump denies.

In total, the prosecution found that Cohen was paid $420,000 by Trump and his trust in 2017. Cohen told jurors in his testimony that this sum was discussed at a meeting with Trump and then-Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg days before Trump’s inauguration. It includes the $130,000 in hush money, $50,000 toward a vendor payment Cohen had addressed for Trump, $180,000 to cover any tax liability on those two payments and a $60,000 bonus.

The various amounts were documented on a handwritten note by former Trump Organization controller Jeffrey McConney, who testified to a separate meeting with Weisselberg where they discussed the repayment plan to Cohen.

In the meeting with Trump and Weisselberg, Cohen testified, the men decided he would be repaid for his $130,000 payment to Daniels through twelve $35,000 payments.

In total, Cohen sent 11 invoices to Weisselberg in 2017 for ‘services rendered’. He later testified that no services were in fact rendered, and that the check was really ‘reimbursement of hush money’.

In total, 12 vouchers were created to record the payments to Cohen. Vouchers are a standard business practice to record how much money a company spends, and to detail who is paid and why, but the prosecution alleges that these vouchers inaccurately describe the money being paid to Cohen as a legitimate legal expense. The voucher entries were recorded by Trump Organization bookkeeper Deborah Tarasoff, who testified that authorization to pay Cohen came from Weisselberg and another top financial officer of the company.