Manafort Trial

[Chad Fuck 17259]

15 hours ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:

 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

At the start of the hearing, the judge addressed the issue of how much evidence he's allowing in about Manafort's lifestyle. He said he understands the numbers are relevant, it's the recitation of what Manafort bought that's the issue — sort of "besmirches" Manafort, judge said

Also: Prosecutor said today they still have "every intention" of calling Rick Gates to testify. Yesterday, the govt had said they may or they may not call him, and that caused a bit of a stir — prosecutor then clarified that he just meant they're evaluating witnesses as they go

Reconvening at 11:20 - next witness is Manafort's bookeeper Heather Washkuhn, per the government

[PappyVanVinceYoung 85]

28 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Look at the indictment.  $849K of payments directed to clothing retailers.  A shitload of others for real estate purchases, cars, landscaping, remodeling, etc.  That's why I say that the clothing items are the only tangible product of his expenditure that can be brought into court to demo to the jury that these expenditures were highly personal in nature and not justifiable business expenses.  So yeah, I can see a bit of this.  It can certainly be overdone and I think the government may be making a mistake to call it evidence of his lavish lifestyle rather than, "look judge, these are frivolous items of clothing that he's trying to claim are legitimate business expenses, we can't show them the landscaping services and only photos of the real estate and cars, so the prejudicial effect here is outweighed by the probative value."

I guess I just wish they brought out some of the big guns of evidence early in the trial. I wish we were seeing the bank statements, tax statements, wire transfer records, etc early on. I hear what you're saying though, and I think you are right. I tend to also think the judge is right to try to move the case along.

[Pig Bellmont 8637]

Isn’t the case scheduled for 3 weeks? The evidence will be presented. Probably methodically and in an un-interesting fashion 

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

5 minutes ago, Pig Bellmont said:

Isn’t the case scheduled for 3 weeks? 

Expected to be over by the end of next week.

[Updawg 2239]

Isn’t the case scheduled for 3 weeks? The evidence will be presented. Probably methodically and in an un-interesting fashion 

Yep. Baby steps.

[Dahobbs 17089]

47 minutes ago, Pig Bellmont said:

Isn’t the case scheduled for 3 weeks? The evidence will be presented. Probably methodically and in an un-interesting fashion 

Exactly. Jury's are not going to get everything at once. And they are not going to understand the relevance of everything they hear at the time. The lawyers usually have to bring it all together in the closing. 

[J.R. 150]

Jury better be picking up what you are laying down well before closing. 

[Brisketexan 103148]

Jury better be picking up what you are laying down well before closing. 

This. Opening should have given them a good roadmap...and you should be following it.

[Dahobbs 17089]

15 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Jury better be picking up what you are laying down well before closing. 

Oh sure, in a general sense. I just meant that not every bit of testimony is going to be super explosive, and in isolation it may not be super obvious what the point is. You absolutely should let the jury know where you are going in the opening so they have a general feel for the case. But people seem to expecting that you walk through the whole case with every witness. You usually can't do that. Each witness can only give you a piece. For instance, you aren't going to ask the sales clerk if the buyer paid income taxes on the funds he used to purchase a coat. All you can do through that witness is establish the purchase itself. 

Edited August 2, 2018 by Dahobbs

[J.R. 150]

Agreed my point was I hope they explain pained clearly that they intended to show very lavish unexplainable spending which would not match his declared income in opening. My guess is they made this very clear and the cantankerous old judge missed it and now doesn’t understand which is a problem with old Federal judges you see a lot. 

[Dahobbs 17089]

7 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Agreed my point was I hope they explain pained clearly that they intended to show very lavish unexplainable spending which would not match his declared income in opening. My guess is they made this very clear and the cantankerous old judge missed it and now doesn’t understand which is a problem with old Federal judges you see a lot. 

I think the judge understands it, but doesn't want them to get excessive. In my view the excessiveness  is what helps prove the willful violation. I really hate it when judges don't let the lawyers actually try their case, but instead wants them to try the judge's case. 

[Al Bundy's Napoleon Hand 13336]

Lookin hip and ready to flip, here comes Captain Kangaroo rockin the plaids that says "Who's bad"? Boing Boing, Mr Roo!

[TwiceHorn 30716]

I think the better explanation is really that the government wants the jury to get pissed off at this jackhole. 

They've got every dollar of unreported income traced and dated, that much is apparent from the indictment.  The only uncertainty is whether the jury accepts that these were legit business expenses of the LLCs or the LLCs paying Manafort's bills for him or that Gates or someone simply didn't tally them correctly for tax purposes. 

None of that is really affected by showing his lavish lifestyle, except to show that the money was spent on things that benefited Manafort and Manafort only.

So, yeah, some of it should come in for that purpose, but I agree with the judge that it shouldn't be pounded into the ground.

A criminal case has a much higher likelihood of being reversed on prejudicial evidence than a civil case, and you can be sure Ellis does not want to retry this thing because of an error he committed.

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

When asked about the names of those Cypriot accounts the jury prev. heard about re: Manafort's expenses, Washkuhn said she didn't know if they were Manafort accounts — and she testiifed about entries in her ledger of $ coming in from those accounts as income or loans

Washkuhn said she tracked Manafort's finances, and provided that info to his tax preparers. The govt's theory is: Manafort was paid for work in Ukraine in overseas accounts, and then used that $ to fund his lifestyle — and didn't report the income or overseas accounts to the US

Prosecutor said he anticipated two more hours with Washkuhn after we get back from lunch, saying she's also a key witness on the bank fraud claims — the judge urged him to find ways to speed things up (but the back and forth betwen the judge and the govt is much less tense today)

[Superhero 8570]

Thought I'd just put this here

[Nice Guy Eddie 13272]

How is this not going to be an open-and-shut case in proving he hid a tremendous amount of money from the US govt?  He paid for many expenses using foreign accounts that his accountant is saying she never heard of.      Or is he mainly going to fight the obstruction of justice and violating the foreign lobbying law?

[atomheartbevo 88751]

6 minutes ago, Superhero said:

Thought I'd just put this here

A tribute photo?  

That's a bold move.

[Jhawk 1075]

3 hours ago, Kyrie Eleison said:

oh...okay, counselor.

your reference to "this dickhead's character" wasn't to Ross, as you so deftly tried to move the goalpost; you meant that about Manafort.  that, too, was specifically who i was referencing.

your fear is that this character will bled over into changing public opinion of your beloved team, the GOP.  as well you should be afraid of that...they're fucking scum.

The GOP isn’t going to go to jail here. Completely irrelevant to the trial. Manafort also worked for the dems. 

It is pretty easy to make this case which is why it shouldn’t take long. I think the prosecution is trying to tie EVERYTHING he ever bought to his personal expenses and not business. So things like private jet charters where he claimed it as an expense when he was in Hawaii. He can claim that as business if he was on business. Maybe he did that a ton. To have the bombshell case they want they need to show he was spending millions and millions on himself. I think they’re using things like jackets which are obviously afoul of the law and then they’re going to say something like “and oh yeah there were 10mm in private jet rides too.” And hoping that those rides will just be tacked on without much questioning from the jury if they are legit expenses or not. This case is a giant nothing burger if he only goes down for not paying taxes on $1mm of income over 10 years. If they get him for $10mm or more then they can start to paint pictures in greater investigations.

[Tuco 5003]

5 minutes ago, Jhawk said:

This case is a giant nothing burger if he only goes down for not paying taxes on $1mm of income over 10 years. If they get him for $10mm or more then they can start to paint pictures in greater investigations.

What the fuck are you talking about. 

[TwiceHorn 30716]

7 minutes ago, Jhawk said:

The GOP isn’t going to go to jail here. Completely irrelevant to the trial. Manafort also worked for the dems. 

It is pretty easy to make this case which is why it shouldn’t take long. I think the prosecution is trying to tie EVERYTHING he ever bought to his personal expenses and not business. So things like private jet charters where he claimed it as an expense when he was in Hawaii. He can claim that as business if he was on business. Maybe he did that a ton. To have the bombshell case they want they need to show he was spending millions and millions on himself. I think they’re using things like jackets which are obviously afoul of the law and then they’re going to say something like “and oh yeah there were 10mm in private jet rides too.” And hoping that those rides will just be tacked on without much questioning from the jury if they are legit expenses or not. This case is a giant nothing burger if he only goes down for not paying taxes on $1mm of income over 10 years. If they get him for $10mm or more then they can start to paint pictures in greater investigations.

Read the indictment, it's linked above.  You can see each payment, what it was for, allegedly, and where it was from.  Assuming the categories are accurate and provable, they stayed away from anything like jet charters that might actually properly be categorized as business expenses.

[Washpark 176]

7 minutes ago, Tuco said:

What the fuck are you talking about. 

1234

[Dertyberd 394]

It's a giant nothing burger to hide income from Russian oligarchs for your work putting Russian friendly leaders in Ukraine.  This has nothing to do with his work as a simple convention manager for the trump campaign.  He just knew how to count votes and make sure the convention ran smoothly and folks could interact.  It's so obvious that this has anything to do with the Russian witch hunt.  fuck me.  

[hayden_horn 11311]

generally, when people employ the word "nothingburger," which is the stupidest affectation possible, i've found that they are trying to hide a giant double bacon cheeseburger behind their big bag of nothing.

[triplehorn 2664]

 

continued:

-Occasionally she would see movement in his accounts from other accounts she never heard of. When she asked Manafort for records, "sometimes" he would provide, sometimes not.

-The following companies she didn't know about: Black Sea View Ltd., Global Highway Ltd., Leviathan Advisers Ltd., Lucicle Consultants, Peranova, Global Endeavor, Pompolo Ltd., Yiakora Ventures and at least 3 others.

-On one of his ledgers, there was a listing from Global Highway Ltd for $375K, coded on the ledger as "income" but when prosecutors asked her if she knew where it had come from, she said she had no idea.

-The same thing happened with items on his ledger listed as liabilities (aka loans) she said. One "loan" appeared for $275K from Yiakora Ventures to Manafort, another Yiakora "loan" was $1.9M

______

The remark "he approved every penny" stands out.  This is not someone who was ignorant of the nature of cash movements in his name, and he kept a lot hidden from those tasked to keep track of his cash movements.

[jimmyjazz 45055]

1 hour ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

How is this not going to be an open-and-shut case in proving he hid a tremendous amount of money from the US govt?  He paid for many expenses using foreign accounts that his accountant is saying she never heard of.      Or is he mainly going to fight the obstruction of justice and violating the foreign lobbying law?

Now wait a minute.  Just yesterday @sheeeit provided a perfectly logical explanation of how this all could have gone down.  We need to be very careful that we don't jump to conclusions.  We need to be more like @sheeit Putin's lackey.

 

[triplehorn 2664]

Author is same as above: Manafort Accountant Says She Didn’t Know of Offshore Accounts

The govt so far has presented four allegedly fake invoices Manafort used to extract even more money from his shell companies.  Note the walk through of Manafort's ways of handling illicit cash flow overlaps the campaign and election through the end of 2016.

Quote

"According to Washkuhn, NKSFB charged Manafort $100,000 annually to track his business and personal expenses.

She met Manafort a handful of times over the years, primarily communicating by email on a weekly or biweekly basis to discuss his accounts.

She met Rick Gates only once in 2011 and was told by Manafort that if he was unavailable, NKSFB “were to go to Rick with business questions.”

“Who gave you access to the account information?” Andres asked.

“Mr. Manafort did,” she said.

Despite their frequent communication, Washkuhn said Manafort never told her that he controlled various offshore accounts including Leviathan Advisors.

According to a ledger displayed by the special counsel’s team Thursday, the firm paid Manafort and his wife, Kathleen, more than $2 million at one point.

When Washkuhn asked for underlying loan documents, she claims Manafort didn’t provide them.

When preparing ledgers at the end of the year – which were ultimately turned over to his tax preparers – Washkuhn also said she occasionally saw activity in the accounts that was unfamiliar.

“Did he ever give you the underlying records you were looking for then?” Andres said.

“Sometimes,” Washkuhn replied.

More testimony continues after recess and it is unclear if another witness will be called.

Prosecutors told Judge T.S. Ellis III they expect her testimony to continue for at least two hours more Thursday but Ellis beseeched Andres to consider abbreviating his line of questioning for Washkuhn.

“She plays a relevant role in the bank and tax fraud,” Andres said before clarifying that she was not involved but had critical information about Manafort’s finances.

This morning, Manafort’s attorneys argued with prosecutors over documents the government wants to admit as trial exhibits. While all parties agreed the documents were authentic, defense attorneys objected to using parts of the documents since they aren’t exempt from evidentiary rules against hearsay.

“The show is over as to hearsay,” Ellis said.

After three days, it appears the theory the government is pursuing is that in addition to squirreling away money in offshore accounts to cheat the IRS, Manafort also created numorous fake invoices to extract even more money from his shell companies. So far the government has presented four allegedly fake invoices to witnesses on the stand.

The defense meanwhile has been steadily advancing a scenario in which Manafort business associated Rick Gates created the fake invoices to embezzle his one-time friend and colleague.

After the jury returned from a lunch recess, Washkuhn and Andres continued their walk through years of financial data from Manafort’s companies, starting in 2012 and moving through the end of 2016.

 

 

[JBJ 3591]

1 hour ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

How is this not going to be an open-and-shut case in proving he hid a tremendous amount of money from the US govt?  He paid for many expenses using foreign accounts that his accountant is saying she never heard of.      Or is he mainly going to fight the obstruction of justice and violating the foreign lobbying law?

Because benefits-in-kinds are not taxed like income at it isn't the employee's job to determine which is which.  This isn't nearly as clear-cut as people want it to be.

[jimmyjazz 45055]

Quote

Black Sea View Ltd., Global Highway Ltd., Leviathan Advisers Ltd., Lucicle Consultants, Peranova, Global Endeavor, Pompolo Ltd., Yiakora Ventures

Yeah, nothing stands out there.

[Pig Bellmont 8637]

lol at the trolls coming out to argue Manafort won’t be found guilty. 

[Tuco 5003]

Yiakora Ventures tweets. I'll give them an E for effort:

Quote

does anybody want to buy some rugs......

i bought too many rugs and my wife is mad at me. someone please buy some of these goddamn rugs....

To the American people, I regret buying so many rugs. I bought more rugs than I have rooms in my house. It was a ridiculous amount of rugs.

[Gap03 3143]

The prosecution seems to be doing a pretty good job of using the bookkeeper to paint a picture of Manafort being in pretty dire financial straits.  Interesting that all of this is right before Manafort joins the Trump campaign - working for free.  While Manafort's financial situation is relevant to the case at hand as motive, I can't help but think that this might also be used in the court of public opinion to hammer home the reality that Manafort wasn't really working for free - especially given one of his biggest creditors was Oleg Deripaska.  I know that the prosecutors are supposed to be avoiding mentioning Russia, but it will be interesting whether they bring up the Cypriot debt owed to Deripaska at least in passing.

Spoiler

And Washkuhn testified she was sending a series of desperate e-mails to Manafort, seeking payment for a laundry list of Manafort’s personal bills. A tally from early 2016 showed Manafort owed more than $1.1 million to pay off credit cards and other expenses from lavish spending.

“$120K is urgently needed for your personal bills,” Washkuhn wrote to Manafort in an e-mail that was shown to the jury.

In another e-mail from January 2016, Washkuhn wrote to Manafort that taxes were due that day on a New York City property he owned.

Davis Manafort Partners was also struggling to pay its bills. In an email to Rick Gates in April 2016, Washkuhn wrote the firm’s medical insurance was going to be cancelled because the bill hadn’t been paid. She said to send money “ASAP.”

[DixonHur 10807]

12 minutes ago, JBJ said:

Because benefits-in-kinds are not taxed like income at it isn't the employee's job to determine which is which.  This isn't nearly as clear-cut as people want it to be.

Yes they are 

"Fringe benefits are generally included in an employee’s gross income (there are some exceptions). The benefits are subject to income tax withholding and employment taxes. Fringe benefits include cars and flights on aircraft that the employer provides, free or discounted commercial flights, vacations, discounts on property or services, memberships in country clubs or other social clubs, and tickets to entertainment or sporting events.

In general, the amount the employer must include is the amount by which the fair market value of the benefits is more than the sum of what the employee paid for it plus any amount that the law excludes. There are other special rules that employers and employees may use to value certain fringe benefits. See Publication 15-B, Employers' Tax Guide to Fringe Benefits, for more information."

 

[woohorn 1130]

Because benefits-in-kinds are not taxed like income

Except that they are.

Cash, check, property, or free service from employer to employee is taxable ordinary income at FMV unless specific exclusion applies.

Pretty simple.

[woohorn 1130]

Defense rebuttal witness...

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

23 minutes ago, Pig Bellmont said:

lol at the trolls coming out to argue Manafort won’t be found guilty. 

Yeah, this is hilarious. 

This is Robert Mueller's Harlem Globetrotters vs Aggy JV team. 

Edited August 2, 2018 by Hugo Stiglitz

[triplehorn 2664]

more from courthouse brandi:

 

"Building on the prosecution’s theory that it was Manafort who approved finances, Washkuhn recounted an email chain she shared with Gates.

In March 2016, Gates emailed her saying “Paul wants to add accrual information [to a profit & loss sheet]. Can you resubmit [the sheet] as a Microsoft Word document since the PDF sent is crooked?” Gates told her he wished to send the updated info to a loan offcr at Bank of CA

Washkuhn told him NKSFB couldn’t send him the Word document because it wasn’t company policy. She offered instead to rescan the document but Gates kept at it. “I’m confused, why can’t you send? Your scanner doesn’t work,” Gates wrote.

She offered to send a hardcopy but Gates declined the offer. “Poor system. If it creates electronic records it should be able to print,” he wrote. Finally he asked her if she could add a $2.6 million accrual to Davis Manafort Parnters International for 2015.

“I told him I couldn’t add it that way since we go by cash accrual only,” Washkuhn told prosecutors. Raising his ire for a third time, Gates shot back an email to the accountant. “So, none of your corporate clients have accrued income. Doesn’t make sense,” he wrote.

Now, I'm not an attorney, but it seems pretty obvious to me - why would Gates want a word doc? Cus you can alter them. If you were so inclined."

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

[jimmyjazz 45055]

"The PDF is crooked."

Well, no shit.

[Tuco 5003]

Article from February.

Quote

The indictment also suggests that Manafort's lack of technology savvy helped prosecutors build a case against Manafort and Gates. The pair allegedly submitted a variety of fraudulent documents to lenders in order to borrow money against properties purchased with overseas funds—funds that were never reported to the IRS. One reason prosecutors were able to build a paper trail against the pair: Manafort needed Gates's help to convert a PDF document to Word format and back again.

In 2016, Manafort allegedly wanted to create a fake profit-and-loss statement for his company, Davis Manafort Partners, in order to inflate his income and qualify for a loan.

"Manafort emailed Gates a .pdf version of the real 2016 DMI P&L, which showed a loss of more than $600,000," the indictment claims. "Gates converted that .pdf into a Word document so that it could be edited, which Gates sent back to Manafort. Manafort altered the Word document by adding more than $3.5 million in income."

Then, according to the indictment, Manafort "sent this falsified P&L to Gates and asked that the Word document be converted back to a .pdf, which Gates did and returned to Manafort."

By sending these documents back and forth by email, Manafort and Gates made it easy for prosecutors to pinpoint exactly who changed the documents and when.

In another incident earlier that same year, Manafort allegedly submitted another fraudulent profit-and-loss statement to a different lender with his firm's income inflated by $2 million. An employee at this lender, who was apparently aware of Manafort's ruse, replied back, "Looks Dr'd. Can someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me?"

"A subsequent version was submitted to the bank," the indictment says.

 

 

[Nice Guy Eddie 13272]

35 minutes ago, DixonHur said:

Yes they are 

"Fringe benefits are generally included in an employee’s gross income (there are some exceptions). The benefits are subject to income tax withholding and employment taxes. Fringe benefits include cars and flights on aircraft that the employer provides, free or discounted commercial flights, vacations, discounts on property or services, memberships in country clubs or other social clubs, and tickets to entertainment or sporting events.

In general, the amount the employer must include is the amount by which the fair market value of the benefits is more than the sum of what the employee paid for it plus any amount that the law excludes. There are other special rules that employers and employees may use to value certain fringe benefits. See Publication 15-B, Employers' Tax Guide to Fringe Benefits, for more information."

 

maybe it will only take 1 juror saying that those benefits aren't taxed the same so Manafort is innocent.

[Updawg 2239]

In another incident earlier that same year, Manafort allegedly submitted another fraudulent profit-and-loss statement to a different lender with his firm's income inflated by $2 million. An employee at this lender, who was apparently aware of Manafort's ruse, replied back, "Looks Dr'd. Can someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me?"
"A subsequent version was submitted to the bank," the indictment says.


Probably Wells Fargo

[Hugo Stiglitz 23245]

[HenryJames 64910]

 

[The People’s Elbow 707]

10 hours ago, Jhawk said:

The GOP isn’t going to go to jail here. Completely irrelevant to the trial. Manafort also worked for the dems. 

It is pretty easy to make this case which is why it shouldn’t take long. I think the prosecution is trying to tie EVERYTHING he ever bought to his personal expenses and not business. So things like private jet charters where he claimed it as an expense when he was in Hawaii. He can claim that as business if he was on business. Maybe he did that a ton. To have the bombshell case they want they need to show he was spending millions and millions on himself. I think they’re using things like jackets which are obviously afoul of the law and then they’re going to say something like “and oh yeah there were 10mm in private jet rides too.” And hoping that those rides will just be tacked on without much questioning from the jury if they are legit expenses or not. This case is a giant nothing burger if he only goes down for not paying taxes on $1mm of income over 10 years. If they get him for $10mm or more then they can start to paint pictures in greater investigations.

What the fuck are you blathering on about, keyboard warrior? This isn’t MAGA night at your local Lion’s Club bingo night; shut the fuck up and learn something. 

[Fudge Nuggets 18825]

11 hours ago, JBJ said:

Because benefits-in-kinds are not taxed like income at it isn't the employee's job to determine which is which.  This isn't nearly as clear-cut as people want it to be.

Man, I wish you were my accountant so I didn’t have to pay tax on my BIK the last 15 years. Wait, no I don’t want you as an accountant because I don’t want to go to jail. 

[Tuco 5003]

The Washingtonian discusses the trial with Franklin Foer, Atlantic journalist who has been studying Manafort.

A couple of excerpts:

Quote

What’s the biggest wild card in the trial right now?

I’m most fascinated by the story of this bank in Chicago run by this guy called Stephen Calk. They received a loan application from Paul Manafort in the summer of 2016. And officially the bank rejected the loan because it was obviously dodgy. But then Manafort, according to Mueller’s folks, promised this guy a spot on Donald Trump’s team of economic advisors—there were just 13 of them, and he was with some fairly august people. The day that Manafort resigns from the Trump campaign, he opens up an LLC, and he starts to get loans from this guy. And you’ve got 16 million dollars in loans after he resigned. That’s just so shady, so suggestive. It makes you wonder what else in the Trump campaign was Paul Manafort willing to trade.

Quote

Do you have any idea what’s going through his mind as he’s watching this proceed?

I think he’s always gotten away with it, so deep down, he thinks that there’s a fair shot that he’ll get away with it again.

 

[Tuco 5003]

Two of the five immune witnesses are Calk's underlings. 

Chicago Sun

Quote

Calk, the founder and CEO of The Federal Savings Bank of Chicago, 300 N. Elizabeth, and two of his employees loom over the Manafort case. They could turn out to be key players in the first trial for special counsel Robert Mueller and his team.

Mueller’s prosecutors decided to grant immunity to Raico and another bank employee, James Brennan. They are on the witness list in Manafort’s trial in an Alexandria, Va., federal courthouse. Manafort is accused of filing fraudulent information to secure $16 million in loans from Calk’s bank.

Another new item placed on the updated exhibit list on Tuesday that could tell more about Calk and Manafort: Raico’s journal.

Quote

Calk was nervous because theory one, it was dawning on Calk that he might not be on a path for Trump to appoint him Secretary of the Army – or to any job in the Trump administration, or theory two, there were problems with the loan.

 

[TwiceHorn 30716]

17 hours ago, DixonHur said:

Yes they are 

"Fringe benefits are generally included in an employee’s gross income (there are some exceptions). The benefits are subject to income tax withholding and employment taxes. Fringe benefits include cars and flights on aircraft that the employer provides, free or discounted commercial flights, vacations, discounts on property or services, memberships in country clubs or other social clubs, and tickets to entertainment or sporting events.

In general, the amount the employer must include is the amount by which the fair market value of the benefits is more than the sum of what the employee paid for it plus any amount that the law excludes. There are other special rules that employers and employees may use to value certain fringe benefits. See Publication 15-B, Employers' Tax Guide to Fringe Benefits, for more information."

 

Also, "fringe benefits" are provided at the exclusive discretion of the employer.  When the "employee," in this case Manafort, directs the LLC to distribute funds to third parties for personal benefit, it stops being a french benefit and is just straight-up income to Manafort as if the money were distributed to him outright.

[Tuco 5003]

18 hours ago, Updawg said:

In another incident earlier that same year, Manafort allegedly submitted another fraudulent profit-and-loss statement to a different lender with his firm's income inflated by $2 million. An employee at this lender, who was apparently aware of Manafort's ruse, replied back, "Looks Dr'd. Can someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me?"
"A subsequent version was submitted to the bank," the indictment says.


Probably Wells Fargo

The indictment puts it a little more strongly than the article represents:

Quote

The falsified 2016 DMI P&L overstated DMI's income by more than $2 million, which was the amount that Lender B told Manafort he needed to qualify for the loan.  When the document was first submitted to Lender B, a conspirator working at Lender B replied: "Looks Dr'd.  Can't someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me??" A subsequent version was submitted to the bank.

I assume that's Calk, at Federal Savings Bank of Chicago.  He's not listed as a witness and there has not been any public information of an indictment on him. 

Edit: I assumed incorrectly.  The indictment goes on to say Lender D provided 16M in loans between July 16 and Jan 17.  That's probably the Chicago guy. 

Edited August 3, 2018 by Tuco