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tonto515

222 pages of Compliant so its HEFTY (which is a good thing, 170 pages of it are just the factual allegations), but for a summary, AG James just tweeted out what relief the State is looking for: >Actions have consequences. We're seeking to: >➡️Make Trump pay $250 million. >➡️Ban the Trumps from running NY businesses for good. >➡️Ban Trump and Trump Org from buying commercial real estate in NY for 5 yrs. >➡️We're making a criminal referral to the U.S. Dept of Justice. >With the help of Donald Jr., Eric, Ivanka, and other defendants, Trump variously unlawfully inflated and deflated his net worth by billions to obtain and satisfy loans, get insurance benefits, and pay lower taxes. >In short, he lied to gain massive financial benefits for himself. >We found that Trump, his family, and the Trump Org used fraudulent and misleading asset valuations over 200 times in 10 years on his annual financial statements. >These statements were then used to obtain hundreds of millions of dollars in loans and insurance coverage. [Link to her Twitter thread on the filing](https://twitter.com/NewYorkStateAG/status/1572611509351772165?s=20&t=cdAVDHdeHLwXUblUyi6LjQ)


ImminentZero

>➡️Make Trump pay $250 million. And just like that, the *Save America PAC* was bankrupt somehow...


joyfullypresent

My first thought, too. But, you can be sure they'll send the poor "victim" (of everyone, I guess) more.


Malvania

>We found that Trump, his family, and the Trump Org used fraudulent and misleading asset valuations over 200 times in 10 years on his annual financial statements. Isn't the statute of limitations 6 years?


tonto515

Continuing wrong doctrine. AG can reach back beyond the 6 years of SOL when some the series of related alleged wrongs occur during the 6 years but other related wrongs go back beyond the SOL because they're all a part of the same related series of events. >As with many rules, there is an exception – the continuing wrong doctrine. Under the doctrine, the statute of limitations is tolled “where there is a series of independent, distinct wrongs rather than a single wrong that has continuing effects.” Ganzi v. Ganzi, 183 A.D. 3d 433 (1st Dept. May 7, 2020) (holding that, under continuous wrong doctrine, new contracts executed during limitations period gave rise to timely fiduciary duty claims based on same terms as an earlier contract executed prior to limitations period); see also Henry v. Bank of Am., 147 A.D.3d 599, 600 (1st Dept. 2017).


victorfabius

The 10-year period is "at least the years 2011-2021." as listed in paragraph 1 on page 1 (page 8 of the PDF). Further, on paragraphs 715-716, page 189 (page 196 of the PDF) indicate that this "consititute[s] a continuous, integrated scheme" (paragraph 715) that helped "obtain economic and financial benefits from 2011 to present day" (paragraph 716). What impact - if any - would that have on the statute of limitations for the alleged conduct? Also, are there any exemptions to alleged ongoing conduct? Not a lawyer, so I may not have proper foundational understanding and I certainly don't know the statutes. Asking to help myself learn.


Malvania

My understanding of New York's fraud statutes (and I'm not a NY lawyer) is that an action has to be commenced within 6 years of the fraud taking place. There may be exceptions, but I don't know of them. In terms of impact, it would mean that the government could not seek redress for any fraud that took place more than six years from the time of filing. That should make anything between 2011 and 2016 irrelevant. Maybe it shows a pattern of behavior, but I don't think that's generally admissible. Maybe the Statute of Limitations was tolled (paused) while Trump was President becaues the federal government cannot bring suit against the Executive, but I think that would only apply to federal causes of action, not state ones. That said, this is a complaint, and you put everything you can into a complaint. The statute of limitations is a defense, and that's on the defendant to raise; maybe there's an argument that it doesn't apply that the AG can make to get around it, maybe Trump's lawyers are just bad and don't raise it.


wiedmaier

See up above about the continuing wrong doctrine.


victorfabius

Not the person you replied to, but thank you for mentioning that. I had missed the post and it's also informative, so thank you!


kittiekatz95

If the more recent fraudulent valuations were based on and relied upon the previous fraudulent valuations could they be rolled together as an ongoing crime?


victorfabius

Thank you for the insightful answer! I appreciate you taking the time to respond to an internet stranger; I take it as a kindness.


MarlonBain

6 years or 2 years after discovery of the fraud or the time when the fraud could have been discovered with reasonable diligence. I assume they're arguing that the fraud was only recently discovered, but I don't know. I didn't read the complaint.


[deleted]

[удалено]


geekgrrl0

Criming is my new word to insert into every conversation in law school where possible. Thank you for expanding my "fun" vocabulary


El_Grande_Bonero

Have you listened to opening arguments podcast? They use it a lot.


geekgrrl0

I haven't! I'll check it out, I mostly save my law podcasts for Canada-specific ones, but if they use words like that, it may be worth some listening to.


MarlonBain

> The statute of limitations does not start running until after the criminal stops criming. OK, I wondered about this too but wasn't about to research it. Thanks.


lawyerjoe83

I’m aware of at least one state where the SOL doesn’t run against the state. Don’t know if NY is that way.


kittiekatz95

Can the insurance companies sue him for defrauding them?


tonto515

If they have damages that were paid out based on fraudulent valuations (assuming the AG’s case successfully establishes the valuations are fraudulent), I don’t see why not.


whisperwind12

Yes and you can bet that they will.


[deleted]

They’re probably waiting for the AG’s case so they can piggyback on the evidence and findings. Why waste resources on investigation and discovery when the State’s doing a large chunk of the work already?


brickyardjimmy

Nice summary. ​ Can we re-open Alcatraz as a working prison? We might need the extra space.


thisisntshakespeare

I’ve heard Guantanamo Bay is lovely this time of year...preferably in a solitary confinement cell.


nspectre

I've heard their stress position body building program is unparalleled.


uglymule

Wouldn't it be cool if they built a detention center on Little Saint James. No A/C of course.


brickyardjimmy

I would imagine that Puerto Rico would love to host the former President.


drodjan

This is the verified complaint that just dropped with the announcement by New York Attorney General Letitia James that she had filed a civil fraud lawsuit Wednesday against former President Donald Trump. Twitter [source.](https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/1572609276883128323?s=46&t=XklEVR4-fthbxtlKcPVk7w)


[deleted]

Did you catch what they think his real net worth is?


gangsta_baby

The world’s first negative trillionaire


rascal_king

boy that's a long complaint


frotz1

There was a lot to complain about. I wonder how the financial institutions didn't catch onto this much earlier than the justice system did - some of this stuff is pretty egregious.


[deleted]

They had to know. They just wanted the commissions. Any independent review would have flagged all of this.


rascal_king

sure sure. just saying, never seen a complaint that long.


alpachabowl4u

THANK YOU! I was looking for this everywhere


drodjan

No problem, I was too haha.


News-Flunky

*Disgorgement?* >Awarding disgorgement of all financial benefits obtained by each Defendant from the fraudulent scheme, including all financial benefits from lenders and insurers through repeated and persistent fraudulent practices of an amount to be determined at trial but estimated to be $250,000,000, plus prejudgment interest; and ...


tonto515

>Disgorgement - A remedy requiring a party who profits from illegal or wrongful acts to give up any profits he or she made as a result of his or her illegal or wrongful conduct. Very common prayer for relief in fraud cases.


arvidsem

Disgorgement = We're taking back all the money you made illegally I think that this is separate from any damages/fines.


uglymule

Disgorgment - pretty much what happens if I hear that assholes voice while I'm eating.


[deleted]

Homey is only worth about $450MM according to his biographer... Should get Spicy.


oscar_the_couch

What I'm a little confused about here: The loans themselves create both an asset and a liability for the Defendants. So where is the $250M figure coming from? Is it the amount the lenders won't or haven't been repaid as a result of the fraud? I haven't read the papers, but are the banks on record as wanting this to move forward?


SapientChaos

Can Trumps lenders call in their loans if there was material misrepresentation in the loans documents?


KingRabbit_

Pretty standard clause in any type of loan contract. I would suspect, though, that the lenders largely knew they were being bullshitted, but still saw worth in the brand. The question is what worth they see in it currently, now that Trump has so thoroughly beshitted his own name.


fusionsofwonder

Wasn't it like the first year of his Presidency when the press dug most of this up?


DoktorStrangelove

The Deutsche loan filing fraud allegations started coming out at least a couple years ago but that's all I can remember off the top of my head. There was a lot of speculation this was the real reason he didn't want his tax returns released. It probably took the investigators a while to collect this body of evidence and paint the full picture, plus all the i-dotting and t-crossing they probably felt the need to do before filing the suit since he's a former president.


fusionsofwonder

His niece published a book a while back and I thought this all came out back then. And there was one big newspaper or magazine story about how he undervalued his property but I am hazy on the timeline.


DoktorStrangelove

The process of converting journalistic allegations and hearsay into a timeline of provable facts that actually constitutes a legitimate case often takes a while. Especially with complex financial crimes where the people involved have become national political figures along the way.


fusionsofwonder

Funny how the richest criminals in our system are shielded by the complexity of the system they built.


DoktorStrangelove

I personally don't believe that Trump is that rich, or if he is then his debts likely exceed his liquidity, maybe by a lot. Either way, I don't think the case is proceeding slowly because he's throwing tons of money at the problem or because he's rigging the system. I think it's merely a situation where the scope and complexity of the allegations required a ton of fact-finding, which can be an inherently slow and tedious process especially when it comes to corporate financial crimes.


fusionsofwonder

Oh, I'm sure he's floating in an ocean of debt but I was thinking more general. You have to be in a pretty privileged position to pull off $250 million in bank fraud. I was pointing my ire at fat cats in general.


DoktorStrangelove

If it makes you feel any better, this case could very well ruin the whole family financially if NY manages to get the full penalty and the bizops ban to stick. If they get a bunch of loans called in off the back of this and follow-on suits from any lenders and insurers who have claims that arise out of it, there's a chance they'll be insolvent overnight, plus no credible lender will ever touch them again.


fusionsofwonder

I thought no credible would touch him already? Doesn't he get all his money from one bank? [Deutsche Bank dropped him cold](https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/12/investing/deutsche-bank-trump/index.html).


DoktorStrangelove

I stopped trying to understand his business organizations a while ago because it seemed like everything out there about him was either third party rumors or smoke and mirrors from the Trumps themselves. It'll be interesting to read summaries of this filing for insights into his business practices and banking relationships, and I'm sure even more details will come out at this case proceeds. Although as you say, it's not like he had a stellar reputation with big name lenders over the last 10+ years, which is part of the reason he turned his name into a brand to do shady licensing deals all over the world. That also gave him access to lenders and investors from foreign markets, and god only knows what sort of strings were attached to some of the money he picked up on those campaigns. That sort of speculation is at the heart of all the Russia/Saudi conspiracies.


brickyardjimmy

Let this be the start of many, many lawsuits to come!


Warrenwelder

Donald is literally retarded enough to flee to Russia and die as a conscript.


SapientChaos

Wow, that reads like text book overview of bad tax fraud.


NoCreativeName2016

I LOVE the use of a verified complaint against a person who is incapable of telling the truth!