Either;
A) They have a ringer in the jury and are sure of acquittal.
B) They have a ringer in the Judge and are sure of dismissal.
C) They have grounds for immediate appeal (probably.)
D) They need more “billable hours” on their ledger sheet (see C above.)
Good. Who knows what that dotard judge will do with the instructions. Let’s hope the jury comes back fast with a guilty on all/most counts.
Will there be closing arguments or does this go to jury?
I can imagine the prosecution explaining the definition of bank fraud, just to be certain.
You left out what I think is the most likely answer: there just wasn’t any better option.
I think Manafort was just properly fucked, and he didn’t want to plea out, so what can you do? Represent your client as best you think you’re able, and that might just mean throwing dirt on the prosecution’s most prominent witness without being able to offer much yourself.
Not everything is a secret derp-state conspiracy.
Longer Defense: “We got nuttin’.”
Damn! I was really looking forward to hearing Manafort’s convincing defense of himself.
When I clerked for a trial court judge, the jury went back and immediately sent a note, asking how long they had to deliberate, so that there wouldn’t be any mistrial.
The defense: keep your mouth shut and try to look stupid enough to not figure out that Carter Page was taking illegal steps-- to keep you and your business out of bankruptcy.
I guess this proves the claim that:”there is no defense for the actions of Robert Manafort.”
Club Fed for Christmas!
I’m also cautiously optimistic that everything about the trial is on the up and up, and there was just no defense of Manafort. (Even Ellis’s hijinks have been discussed on Maddow by prosecutors who have argued in front of him before and sat in the trial last week. I’d summarize two different opinions as mixed – one was adamant maybe after Wednesday or Thursday last week that Ellis was not acting abnormally for Ellis, while another earlier in the week had said that she thought it was a little much even for Ellis. This prosecutor did not seem alarmed, though.)
We’ll see, apparently this week probably. Again, my optimism is very cautious, I do not want to jinx anything here.
Trumps gotta be hoping the jury comes back soon and knocks N-Word-Gate out of the news cycle. As we all know, there’s only enough time in a 24-hour news cycle for one topic.
The pardon is his only way out.
And so he rests on his good name. Some defense!
The judge said that being rich is not a crime. But Manafort’s problem is that he isn’t rich. He is poor. He likes to live rich, which led him to tax fraud and bank loan fraud. If he were rich, he could have paid his taxes (well, maybe not) and would not have had to lie to banks to get loans. He might not have needed the loans.
Except DJT has no dog in this fight, and has been distancing himself from PM. A pardon here would connect him to Manifort in even more ways than will emerge in PM’s next trial.
But the evidence that has been presented proves a pay to play scheme between calk, federal savings bank, manafort, the trump campaign and jared…
Several emails appear to show Manafort directing an employee of a Cypriot law firm to send wire transfers to various vendors. In one email from 2012 to a bank employee asking about wires from several of the Cypriot entities, Manafort explains that he has “various contracts with Ukraine” and the “international transfers” are “payment for those services.”
Other emails detail what prosecutors said were Federal Savings Bank Chairman Steve Calk’s attempts to get jobs in the Trump campaign and administration. In an Aug. 4, 2016 email to Manafort, Calk says, “I am happy and willing to serve.” In November, just after the election, Calk sends a petition to be nominated Secretary of the Army to Manafort, asking “what changes and improvements I should make.” Among the qualifications Calk lists — “Mr. Calk willingly risked his national professional and personal reputation as an active, vocal, and early supporter of President-Elect Trump.” He listed the “Perspective Rolls” [sic] he would like in the administration, listing possible prospective jobs he sought, in order. Secretary of the Army was number one, followed by the chiefs of Treasury, Commerce, HUD, and Defense. He said he would also be most interested an ambassadorship in the United Kingdom but would settle for France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan, Ireland, Australia, China, United Nations, the European Union, Portugal, the Vatican, Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Singapore. in that order.
[Exhibit: Memo from bank CEO to Manafort ranking possible Trump administration posts for himself]
In October, when testimony showed Manafort told Calk and then-Federal Savings Bank vice president Dennis Raico he had a “blackout” and needed a loan to cover an extra million dollars, Calk replies, “Consider it done. Dennis has been directed. We will close on time. Can you call my cell this afternoon? I need your advice.”
When Calk sends his resume to Manafort a few weeks later, he thanks him for his “guidance and assistance.”
Another email shows Manafort reached out to President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner on Nov. 30, 2016, to recommend Calk for Secretary of the Army, saying, “His background is strong in defense issues, management and finance.”
The special counsel had tried to introduce these emails through an FBI agent earlier in the case but were blocked by Judge Ellis. They now plan to show them to jurors only in closing arguments.
that and his lawyers had nothing that could withstand cross examination.
But accepting a pardon is an admission of guilt. I think he’s holding out for a commutation of whatever sentence he gets.