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Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday falsely claimed that Manhattan has not tried a murder case in several years while attacking the city's District Attorney.
The Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation, two entities that exist under the umbrella of the Trump Organization, are currently on trial in Manhattan over allegations that they paid personal expenses for some executives without reporting the expenses as income, among other potential offenses. On Thursday, a prosecutor making closing arguments in the case claimed that Trump "knew exactly what was going on with his top executives," despite the fact that the trial had not dealt with his potential involvement up to that point.
Taking to his alternative social media platform, Truth Social, on Tuesday, Trump lambasted the trial as a "witch hunt," and made the inaccurate assertion that murder cases had not been tried in Manhattan in six years in an attempt to call the District Attorney's Office's priorities into question.
"Murder and Violent Crime is at an all-time high in NYC, and the D.A.'s office has spent almost all of its time & money fighting a political Witch Hunt for D.C. against 'Trump' over Fringe Benefits, something that in the history of our Country, has never been so tried in Court before," Trump wrote in the post. "Two weeks at trial, yet no MURDER CASE has gone to trial in 6 years, much to the consternation of victims mothers and families who are devastated that NOTHING is being done to bring JUSTICE. Too busy on 'Donald.'"
Prominent examples of murder cases tried in Manhattan in the last six years include the cases of Rod Covlin, a New York stockbroker who was convicted of the murder of his estranged wealthy wife after attempting to frame his 9-year-old daughter, and musician Nathaniel "Kidd Creole" Glover, who was convicted of manslaughter this year in the death of John Jolly, 55, whom he encountered while heading to work at a copy shop in Midtown Manhattan late at night.
Newsweek reached out to the Manhattan District Attorney's Office for comment.
In the post, Trump also claimed that violent crime rates in New York are at "an all-time high," echoing similar claims made by conservatives about numerous major American cities. This claim is also inaccurate, according to data on major felony rates in the city compiled by the New York City Police Department.
According to the data, there were 488 cases of murder or non-negligent manslaughter in the city in 2021, down notably from 673 cases in 2000. The number was also surpassed as recently as 2011 when 515 cases were reported. Rape cases were also down in 2021 compared to 2000, with 1,491 cases versus 2,068. Other categories included in the report, robbery, felony assault, burglary, grand larceny, and grand larceny of a motor vehicle, were all down across the board compared to twenty years ago.
Continuing the office's pursuit of potential offenses committed by Trump or his many companies, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg on Monday announced the hiring of former Justice Department (DOJ) official Matthew Colangelo as a senior counsel. Colangelo has extensive experience in legal matters involving Trump, having previously been involved with a DOJ investigation into the Trump Foundation charity and the New York Attorney General's opposition to the Trump administration's attempt to add a citizenship question to the U.S. census.
About the writer
Thomas Kika is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in upstate New York. His focus is reporting on crime and national ... Read more