Tag Archives: tax fraud

business news, crime news

Clean sweep: guilty on all counts!

Donald J. Trumpā€™s life just got a whole lot messier than it was just a few days ago ā€¦ if that is even possible.

A New York jury today delivered the news that the Trump Organization ā€” Donaldā€™s cherished business ā€œempireā€ ā€” is guilty on all 17 counts of various forms of tax fraud.

To be sure, Trump himself isnā€™t going to prison for the crimes committed by his organization. His former chief financial officer, Alan Weissenberg, already has pleaded guilty to some of the charges leveled against the Trump Organization.

This just spells trouble with a capital ā€œTā€ for The Donald.

The trial that concluded only after a few days centered on how the TO monkeyed around with its assets to seek favorable loans and to avoid paying taxes. The company overpaid its top executives without paying taxes on their income. It lavished gifts on them in the form of luxury lodging and motor vehicles.

What is so very weird about all of this is how Trump himself has managed ā€” so far ā€” to stay above the fray. Why is weird? Because Trump is known to be a mega-micromanager of his business dealings. Nothing gets done, no transaction is completed, no money changes hands without Trumpā€™s personal knowledge or even his imprimatur.

Trump is sure to denigrate the judge and the jurors. He is certain to lay waste to the prosecutors.

He will not be able to expunge the record of what the jury found, which is that the once-mighty business empire he commanded has been revealed to be run by cheaters.

Come to think of it, the Trump Organization is the mirror image of The Donald.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, national news, political news

Younger Biden under intense scrutiny

Here we go. There well might be a criminal referral coming forward that suggests that Hunter Biden, son of the president of the U.S.A., could be indicted for tax fraud and for an allegation that he lied while purchasing a firearm.

A federal prosecutor in Delaware reportedly is wrapping up a probe. Reports suggest that the investigative team believes it has evidence of wrongdoing. The task now falls to the U.S. attorney to decide whether to bring charges forward.

Sigh … There appears to be questions about the probe. Chief among them might be whether the U.S. attorney, a Donald J. Trump appointee, is too jaded by the former POTUS’s loathing of the Bidens to render a fair and just decision on whether to indict.

I guess my major concern deals with whether the president is going to suffer needless political damage from whatever his son did to get indicted. I also know that the real world often acts in unjust and unfair ways. This might be one of those times.

There once was a time when we didn’t fixate on the political connections of career federal prosecutors. Those days are gone. Perhaps we can thank Trump for the change in attitude, as he was prone to criticize judgments against by labeling jurists as “Obama judges” or “Clinton judges.”

Are we now going to dismiss any indictment because it comes from a “Trump prosecutor”?

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

DC riot, legal news, national news, political news

A lockup in Trump’s future?

I am trying to imagine what I thought not so long ago was an impossible ending to a former presidentā€™s legal difficulty, but which is be. ginning to look entirely possible ā€¦ although not yet probable.

It is that Donald Trump might face a criminal indictment on multiple fronts. For tax fraud. For interfering in a state election. For violating a federal law designed to protect national security. Hmm. I might have missed something, but you get the picture ā€¦ yes?

Trumpā€™s business already is under indictment for multiple allegations, including tax fraud; the Manhattan (N.Y.) district attorneyā€™s office alleges that his business inflated the cost of real estate to get sweeter loan deals. No can do, folks.

The Fulton County (Ga.) district attorney is examining whether Trump broke the law by pressuring the Georgia secretary of state to ā€œfindā€ enough votes to swing Georgia from the Joe Biden win column to Trump; hey, we have that act on recording.

The latest might be the most serious of all, in that the National Archives has alleged that Trump spirited classified documents from the White House and stashed them in Mar-a-Lago, Fla., where Donald and Melania Trump live; the Presidential Records Act expressly forbids such thievery of national security documents.

All told, if Trump is indicted and convicted of these crimes, he faces a lengthy prison term.

Isnā€™t that just rich?

And I havenā€™t mentioned ā€” until this very moment ā€” the House select panel looking into the 1/6 insurrection incited by Trump on that terrible day just two weeks before he left office.

Moreover, weā€™re beginning to find out that Donald Trump ā€” who boasted of his fantastic business acumen ā€” isnā€™t nearly as rich as he bragged about being. That, folks, doesnā€™t surprise me in the least. I always have said ā€” and I have said so here ā€” that people who are rich and smart donā€™t boast about it. That the ex-POTUS would keep yapping about his wealth and his smarts only tells me he is neither as rich or as smart as he wants to believe.

The most maddening aspect of this moronā€™s trail of idiocy is that he continues to have this weird hold on Republican Party votersā€™ skulls.

But ā€¦ letā€™s allow the legal process to play out. I can wait.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

national news, political news

Congressman Felon ready to quit

Well now, it turns out that the latest case of congressional corruption is going to end the right way for Americans who actually expect their elected representatives to behave legally and ethically.

Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y., who had pleaded guilty to tax fraud, mail fraud and assorted other felonies, is now set to quit his congressional seat.

Good deal. No, it’s aĀ great deal!

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/michael-grimm-resignation-113867.html?hp=l1_3

Grimm is a back-bench member of Congress who once served in the FBI. He campaigned for Congress on a platform of crime-fighting and getting rid of corruption. Then it turns out he’s one of them, one of the bad guys.

And when a reporter had the temerity to question Grimm about the charges hovering over him, the congressman threatened to break the reporter in half and toss him over the railing to the floor of the House of the chamber several dozen feet below. Oh yes: This was captured on video, as the reporter works for a TV station in Grimm’s congressional district.

As Politico reported: “Grimm, a 44-year-old former FBI agent, admitted a week ago to failing to report more than $900,000 in revenue from a Manhattan restaurant, Healthalicious, that he owned from 2007 to 2010.”

Could this man vote on tax policies affecting all Americans — including those who live far from his Staten Island district? Of course not. Good riddance, young man.

 

national news, political news

Step down, Congressman 'Felon'

U.S. Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y., has pleaded guilty to tax fraud.

He faces a 36-year prison term at his sentencing set for next June. Meanwhile, he’s going to continue serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, voting on bills (one can hope, at least), some of which deal with tax policy — you know, determining how much you and I pay in federal taxes.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/12/23/grimm_pleads_guilty_to_tax_fraud_wont_resign_125056.html

He shouldn’t be doing that. He needs to go. Now.

Grimm was indicted on 20 counts. They involve mail fraud and assorted business dealings involving the health food company he owned prior to entering Congress.

All Americans ought to be concerned about this guy — although some of us aren’t, obviously — because he legislates federal law that affects all of us. He no longer has credibility. None.

He’s also known for one other thing. Last year he threatened to kill a reporter who asked him about all of this. OK, he didn’t say he would “kill” the young man; all he did was threaten to “break you in half” and toss the reporter from a balcony overlooking the Capitol Rotunda — which likely would have resulted in the reporter’s death.

Grimm apologized for his intemperate response to a reporter’s legitimate question.

But, hey, let’s not digress.

Rep. Grimm shouldn’t be serving in the U.S. Congress.