What legal troubles is Donald Trump facing? – Reuters
Oct 2 (Reuters) – Former U.S. President Donald Trump faces numerous legal troubles as he seeks the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential election. Trump, 77, denies any wrongdoing.
Here is a look at the major legal cases involving Trump.
New York state Attorney General Letitia James sued Trump and his family business, the Trump Organization, in September 2022.
James accused Trump of lying from 2011 to 2021 about asset values, including for his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and Trump Tower penthouse in Manhattan, as well as his own net worth, to obtain better terms from lenders and insurers.
On Sept 26, Justice Arthur Engoron of a New York state court in Manhattan said Trump committed repeated and persistent fraud, overstating his net worth by between $812 million and $2.2 billion depending on the year.
Engoron ordered the cancellation of certificates that let some of Trump's businesses, including the Trump Organization, operate in New York. He also said he would appoint one or more independent receivers to manage the businesses' dissolution.
James is seeking at least $250 million in penalties, a ban against Trump and his sons Donald Jr and Eric running businesses in New York, and a five-year commercial real estate ban against Trump and the Trump Organization.
The trial, now largely limited to damages, kicks off on Monday.
Trump on Aug. 15 was hit with a fourth set of criminal charges when a Georgia grand jury indicted him after an investigation by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis into his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden in the state.
The indictment lists 19 defendants and 41 felony counts in all. The defendants were charged under a broadly-written racketeering statute that originally targetted the mafia and carries a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.
Counts against Trump include violation of Georgia's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act and conspiracy to commit forgery and conspiracy to commit impersonating a public officer.
Trump has pleaded not guilty.
Other defendants include Mark Meadows, Trump's former White House chief of staff, and lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman and Sidney Powell. All have pleaded not guilty.
Trump pleaded not guilty on Aug. 3 to charges brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith in federal court in Washington that he conspired to defraud the United States by preventing Congress from certifying Biden's 2020 election victory over him and to deprive voters of their right to a fair election.
On Jan. 6, 2021, Trump supporters attacked the U.S. Capitol in a failed bid to prevent congressional certification of Biden's victory. Prosecutors say Trump exploited the attack, refusing advice that he send a message directing rioters to leave.
Trump and his allies advanced claims of voting fraud that they knew to be untrue, prosecutors said. The indictment says close advisers, including senior intelligence officials, told Trump repeatedly that the election results were legitimate.
Trump and others organized fraudulent slates of electors in seven U.S. states, all of which he lost in the election, to submit their votes to be counted and certified as official by Congress on Jan. 6, the indictment said.
The trial is scheduled for March 4, 2024.
Trump on June 13 pleaded not guilty in federal court in Miami to charges also brought by Smith that he unlawfully kept classified national security documents after leaving office in January 2021 and misled officials who sought to recover them.
Smith accuses Trump of risking national secrets by taking thousands of sensitive papers with him when he left the White House and storing them in a haphazard manner at his Mar-a-Lago Florida estate and his New Jersey golf club, according to the indictment.
Records included information about the U.S. nuclear program and potential vulnerabilities in the event of an attack, the indictment said.
Trump faces charges that include violations of the Espionage Act, which criminalizes unauthorized possession of national defense information, and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Also charged are Trump's aide Walt Nauta and another Trump employee, Carlos De Oliveira, both with attempting to delete security camera footage at Mar-a-Lago after a grand jury subpoenaed the videos. Both have pleaded not guilty.
The trial is scheduled for May 20, 2024.
Trump on April 4 pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records after a grand jury in Manhattan indicted him over hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 presidential election.
Michael Cohen, Trump's former personal lawyer and fixer, paid Daniels $130,000 for her silence about a sexual encounter she said she had with Trump in 2006. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg accused Trump of trying to conceal a violation of election laws.
Trump has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels but acknowledged having reimbursed Cohen for the $130,000 payment.
Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations and other crimes in 2018 and was sentenced to three years in prison.
A trial is scheduled for March 25, 2024.
A jury in federal court in Manhattan on May 9 found Trump liable for sexually abusing writer E. Jean Carroll in the mid-1990s and then defaming her by lying about it in 2022. The jury awarded Carroll $5 million in damages. Trump is appealing.
Carroll is seeking at least $10 million more in a separate defamation lawsuit over a similar denial by Trump in 2019. She amended that complaint after Trump criticized the $5 million verdict on CNN and on his social media platform.
Trump has denied meeting Carroll and accused her of making up her story to sell her memoir.
A trial is scheduled for Jan. 15, 2024.
Reporting by Joseph Ax, Luc Cohen, Karen Freifeld, Susan Heavey, Sarah N. Lynch, Jonathan Stempel, Jack Queen and Jacqueline Thomsen; Editing by Noeleen Walder, Will Dunham, Howard Goller and Daniel Wallis
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