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Judge Arthur Engoron has ordered more than $350 million in penalties against Donald Trump and his co-defendants in the New York civil fraud case.
In his Friday ruling, Engoron also prohibited the former president from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or other legal entity in the state for a period of three years.
The judge ordered the same conditions for former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg and a former controller of the company, Jeffrey McConney, and he also permanently enjoined the two from serving in the financial control function of any New York corporation or similar business entity registered and/or licensed in the state. Engoron also barred the former president’s adult sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., from serving as officers or directors of New York corporations or other entities for two years.
Engoron further ordered Trump and related entities including the Trump Organization barred from applying for loans from any New York financial institution for three years. And the judge ordered the independent monitor in the case to continue for at least three years.
New York Attorney General Letitia James had sought $370 million in penalties and to permanently bar Trump from doing business in the state’s real estate industry. Citing corporate malfeasance, James also asked for the monitor to closely oversee the Trump Organization for at least five years, as well as permanent statewide industry bans for Weisselberg and McConney, along with five-year bans for Trump’s adult sons.
In a scathing opinion, Engoron wrote of the defendants:
Their complete lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological. They are accused only of inflating asset values to make more money. The documents prove this over and over again. This is a venial sin, not a mortal sin. Defendants did not commit murder or arson. They did not rob a bank at gunpoint. Donald Trump is not Bernard Madoff. Yet, defendants are incapable of admitting the error of their ways. Instead, they adopt a “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” posture that the evidence belies.
The civil defendants contested the state’s case, and the former president himself even spoke in his own defense during closing arguments.
James had already won an important part of the case even before trial, with Engoron finding fraud in a September ruling. That left other aspects, including how much the defense owes, to be determined in Engoron’s post-trial ruling.
To be sure, this ruling will likely be appealed, so it won’t necessarily be the final word on the fate of the Trump empire.
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