🎙️ Voice is AI-generated. Inconsistencies may occur.
The judge in former President Donald Trump's New York fraud trial has refused to dismiss the case, much to the annoyance of his lawyer.
This is the fourth time that Trump's lawyer, Christopher Kise, has sought a directed verdict and the fourth time that Judge Arthur Engoron has immediately refused. With a directed verdict, a judge declares that the evidence in a case is so weak that he dismisses the case before it has been completed.
"Maybe I'm wasting my time, maybe I'm wasting my breath," Trump lawyer, Christopher Kise, told a Manhattan court.
Judge Engoron made his decision after a banker said that Trump's inflated property evaluations were not that unusual.
"I would point out that the mere fact that the lenders were happy doesn't mean that the statute wasn't violated, doesn't mean that the other statutes weren't violated," Judge Engoron told the court, according to Courthouse News. Kise appeared flustered after the judge's ruling.
"If everyone is of the view that evidence doesn't matter, then maybe I'm wasting my time," Kise added. "Maybe I'm wasting my breath...If that is where we are, then I don't know what country we landed in in the state of New York."
Kise made his request after hearing defense evidence from a Deutsche Bank official who said that banks accept that their calculation of a client's worth may differ from the client's.
"I'm just going to renew our motion for a directed verdict," Trump's lead attorney Kise said, Courthouse News reported. "This witness has again testified the bank conducted its own due diligence."
Trump, his two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, as well as the Trump Organization, are co-defendants in the $250 million civil lawsuit brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James. She is accusing the former president of inflating his net worth by billions of dollars to obtain benefits such as better bank loans and reduced tax bills.
The former president has pleaded not guilty and denies any wrongdoing. Trump has repeatedly said that the litigation was politically motivated to derail his 2024 presidential campaign, given he is the frontrunner in the polls for the GOP nomination.
In September, Engoron ruled that Trump, his adult sons, their businesses and executives committed fraud in their property valuations. The court is to decide on six other accusations, including falsifying business records, insurance fraud and conspiracy claims.
Newsweek sought email comment from Trump's lawyer on Wednesday.
Kise told Engoron that evidence from David Williams, a managing director at Deutsche Bank, proved that the Trump Organization didn't benefit from inflating its asset values on financial statements.
Kise said that Trump was still "overqualified" for the Deutsche Bank loans, absolving him of fraud since the bank had "no problem" with Trump overstating his wealth.
"There can be no ill-gotten gains, there can be no disgorgement," Kise said while making the directed verdict application. "This is now the second bank witness who signed off on these loans to testify that there was no problem at any point with these loans."
Williams said in evidence on Tuesday that Deutsche Bank made its own judgments when deciding to issue loans to Trump, and didn't simply rely on Trump's evaluations.
Earlier on Tuesday, Williams said that Deutsche Bank does expect clients-provided information "to be accurate."
"At the same time, it's not industry standard for these financial statements to be audited," he said.
Lawyers for the New York attorney general's office told Engoron that the application for a directed verdict was pointless.
"I don't know what the point of this motion was," attorney Kevin Wallace told Engoron. "The witness did not say that none of this matters. The witness said actually that they expect their clients to tell the truth, and not lie, and not submit fraudulent statements."
Wallace added that the state hadn't even accused the defendants of lying to Deutsche Bank about the loans; rather, it accused them of creating fraudulent financial statements, which were then used in business transactions.
Kise said that "fluctuations" with the value of assets are quite normal and not indicative of fraud.
On October 25, Trump stormed out of court after Engoron refused to issue a directed verdict during the testimony of former Trump attorney, Michael Cohen.
Trump went outside to complain about the case to the media.
At the end of Cohen's testimony later that day, Engoron again refused to issue a directed verdict.
He refused a third time when James' office completed its evidence on November 9.
fairness meter
About the writer
Sean O'Driscoll is a Newsweek Senior Crime and Courts Reporter based in Ireland. His focus is reporting on U.S. law. ... Read more