The NYT reports (gift link).
“While harm certainly occurred, it was not the cataclysmic harm that can justify a nearly half billion-dollar award to the state,” wrote Peter Moulton, one of the appeals judges whose lengthy and convoluted ruling reflected significant disagreement among the five-judge panel.
This is the intermediate appellate court.
The president’s appeal will now most likely move to New York’s highest court, providing him another opportunity to challenge the finding that he was a fraudster....
The finding that he was a fraudster! They only write like that for Trump. For anyone else, I suspect, they'd name the crime — "that he committed fraud" — and not portray the verdict as labeling the person as a member of category of people who commit this sort of crime. Especially with the jocose "-ster" ending — "fraudster."
In denying Mr. Trump’s bid to throw out the case, the court kept in place the ruling that he had committed fraud....
Justice Moulton’s opinion upholding the case and wiping out the financial penalties received one additional vote, from the chief judge, Dianne Renwick.
Another judge, David Friedman, who has been skeptical of the accusations for years, wanted to throw the case out entirely, believing Ms. James had lacked the power to bring it.
Two other judges concluded that Ms. James had the authority to file the case, but wanted to provide Mr. Trump a new trial....
That's a lot of disarray!
Here's the text of the opinions.
ADDED: Trump exults on Truth Social:
TOTAL VICTORY in the FAKE New York State Attorney General Letitia James Case! I greatly respect the fact that the Court had the Courage to throw out this unlawful and disgraceful Decision that was hurting Business all throughout New York State. Others were afraid to do business there. The amount, including Interest and Penalties, was over $550 Million Dollars. It was a Political Witch Hunt, in a business sense, the likes of which no one has ever seen before. This was a Case of Election Interference by the City and State trying to show, illegally, that I did things that were wrong when, in fact, everything I did was absolutely CORRECT and, even, PERFECT. Every single Dollar was thrown out, even the penalties imposed on us by the Corrupt Judge, one of the most overturned in History, Arthur Engoron. I wasn’t given a Jury and, during the course of the Trial, which lasted a long time, was not given one Ruling in my favor by this Political Hack, but worse than him, if that’s possible, was Letitia James, a Corrupt and Incompetent Attorney General who only brought this Case in order to hurt me politically. She is a Trump Deranged Lunatic! They made me bond the outrageous sum, which never happened before, and which cost me Millions of Dollars a month. It should have never been allowed to happen, and everyone knew it! Importantly, the Vote was 5 to 0. I am so honored by Justice David Friedman’s great words of wisdom, which should be read by everyone. I would also like to thank the Court for having the Courage to make this Decision, which is already going down as one of the worst business persecutions in the History of our Country. Sadly, there are other Cases against me that are equally disgraceful, including those headed up by Corrupt Judges, like Juan Merchan, whose daughter collected Millions of Dollars in Fees from Crooked Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, while her father shockingly REFUSED TO RECUSE himself from a vicious and corrupt trial, which is also under Appeal, one in which every Legal Pundit in New York said, “THERE WAS NO CASE!” — Even Editorial Boards said, “DO NOT DO THIS!” Judge Merchan gave me an unprecedented Gag Order, not letting me talk about him or his daughter, or the fact that the Appellate Judges thought he should not be doing the Case, but he did it anyway. Many Lawyers said that his daughter and him created the Greatest Conflict of Interest they had ever seen. Judge Lewis Kaplan, the other remaining Case, whose wife, family, and friends attended his two trials, is as mean and nasty as anyone I have ever met. That Case, also on Appeal, should also never have been brought, and he should be admonished for Abuse, and every other thing that can be thrown at a Corrupt Judge. He loved the publicity, and would not let us present the irrefutable evidence that we wanted to present. This Clinton appointed Judge should not be allowed to get away with this SCAM….
And in case that is too many words, he made it simple 2 minutes later:
Posts
50 comments:
Letitties James and Judge Morongowrong hardest hit…
Just a slow crawl back after the BIllionaire's Club appeared on stage at the Trump 47 inauguration. It's a split court decision now, but NY will be begging for forgiveness with their noses in the dirt in two years.
I wondered who the "James" and "Morongowrong" mentioned on the last thread were.
Question for the legal eagles here. When this entire case gets tossed does Trump have case for malicious or wrongful persecution, wait, prosecution?
Cooledster heads prevailed.
As predicted right here the day the idiot handed down the fine.
Passive voice alert!
While harm certainly occurred...
Oh did it? It just occurred with victims in absentia. That is NO harm occurred, because no ONE was harmed. The "victims" Tish identified and called to testify said they were not harmed, and they loved doing business with Trump and would do it again.
Can't the lying stop yet?
Thank you Madame for that reflection on the use of the word fraudster to cover the findings of the judgesters by the newsters.
They only write like that for Trump.
Why it’s almost as though the man were sui generis.
No surprise that NY judges have TDS.
Even leftist “Judges” couldn’t wrangle out what crime Trump committed. None of the “injured” parties claimed injury. The banks all say it was business as usual and Trump was a good customer.
“While harm certainly occurred.”
Really? To who? The banks were paid in full. Subsequent to paying the loans off, the banks wanted more of Trumps business.
"Uphold the case so the appeal could continue"? What can that even mean? I assume if the appellate court ruled the charges without merit, the prosecutor could appeal to the NY highest court.
As to the "-ster" ending, maybe that is terminology appropriate to describe the increasingly numerous NY defendants found guilty of something who receive only a slap on the wrist? A gangster, a rape-ster, a bankrob-ster.
What’s amazing is how much harm on the left is self inflicted.
Sepuku: an honorable way to die when facing defeat.
From my unsophisticated point of view, it looked like they were saying the negotiations themselves were fraudulent. But didn’t the bank do its own due diligence? If that’s the standard, how many real-estate deals would be implicated? Ms. Hochul even told the business community not to worry. But what are the odds Mr. Trump was the only one?
Humperdink said...
“While harm certainly occurred.”
Really? To who?
The New York state court system.
In New York State, the Supreme Court is equivalent to Superior Courts in other states. The highest court in New York is the Court of Appeals. Between the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals are the Appellate Division courts, which recently ruled on this case.
Either way it was going to move on to NY Supreme Court.
“On February 18, 2024, during an interview on WABC 770 radio’s “The Cats Roundtable” with John Catsimatidis, Hochul responded to a question about whether New York businesspeople should worry that “if prosecutors could do that to the former president, they can do that to anybody.” She stated:
“Law-abiding and rule-following New Yorkers who are business people have nothing to worry about because they’re very different than Donald Trump and his behavior.”
In other words, we are not after you, only Trump.
The New York State court system was not harmed, they were embarrassed. The appeals court attempted to recover some dignity.
Just more evidence that justice is dead in NY State. Its a far-left politicized shit-show. God knows what the NY State Supreme court will do. You can be sure it will depend 100 percent on how many biased far-left judges are on Court, and not the facts of the case.
The AG never proved her case, couldn't show what harm was done, and went after Trump purely from spite. At least our Lefty friends know understand two can play their game, as the DOJ is going after Democrats for the same "crime". But of course, all together now, "That's different".
The New York courts will never do the correct thing and toss the entire case. This split decision is just all five judges, knowing the case brought by the state was the true fraud committed trying to split the baby. They tossed out the fine because it was the one hook sure to get Trump into the federal court system once New York's was done with it. The highest court in New York will almost surely confirm the tossing of the ridiculous fine but will also uphold the trial and verdict. Eventually, probably sometime in the next decade, a federal court will toss the entire thing.
It is quite remarkable how strongly people, even appellate court judges, who normally profess to be above the fray, react to the very existence of Donald Trump.
The NYT neve… er, ALWAYS disappoints!
so? it's 34 counts of fraudstering ?
do YOU want a President that was Convicted of fraudsteration?
Keldonric said...
From my unsophisticated point of view, it looked like they were saying the negotiations themselves were fraudulent. But didn’t the bank do its own due diligence? If that’s the standard, how many real-estate deals would be implicated? Ms. Hochul even told the business community not to worry. But what are the odds Mr. Trump was the only one?
That is the point. Every single developer in the state of New York who sought financing did exactly what Trump did and went through the exact same process.
They changed laws and made shit up to get Trump.
They could do the exact same thing to anyone who tried to get financing based on collateral in New York State.
Everyone saw the inherent and blatant Stalinism. The courts in New York do nothing but delegitimize the state government.
"No harm done," while true, isn't really the issue, except perhaps for the size of the fine. Tish herself and that Fed Board member could also claim "no harm done," but that shouldn't get them off the hook for mortgage fraud. The real issue is that Trump committed no fraud in the first place. It was up to the lenders to do due diligence on the collateral values, and in any case Tish's "evidence" that the valuations were inflated was also contrived.
323 pages of judicial opinion. I wonder how much was "written" by GPT/LLM.
And the harm? Did they say what it was? Or did they just skip over that part as not worth their time?
this is the court house with the moloch on the roof, in Roman times you would call this a proscription, like what Sulla did to Marius, but hihthe circle turned
they could have had the two demon dogs, but it would have been too obvious,
Leftsters gonna left.
The real problem is not this case, it is the fact that it took so many years for Trump and his organization to be held legally accountable for actions that would have resulted in criminal sanctions and liability for any small business owner. It will be interesting to see what the final appeal is.
Additionally, as far as "lawfare" and wasting resources is concerned, right now the Trump administration is engaging in legal threats to judges; it is denying ordinary citizens and resident aliens basic legal protections, it is marshalling millions of dollars of resources and engaging the services of multiple federal agencies to catch people doing "fare evasion" at metro stops in DC.
The real issue is the absolute lack of legal accountability for the rich and powerful across the board. Trump's good friend Jeffrey Epstein was able to operate for years as a consequence of these legal failures. Trump himself received an absurd amount of legal deference in recent years simply because of his status, money and his political connections.
I agree with the comment about "fraudster" being terminology only used for DJT, but I'm not sure 'jocose' applies. They aren't called mobsters because it's cutesy.
Kak, you just said that the real thing is how long it took to hold Trump accountable for "actions that would have resulted in criminal sanctions and liability for any small business owner. "
Except the Democrat govenor of New York explicitly said that "no, this is only Trump. No one else has to worry, because this only applies to Trump."
So 1) you are wrong and 2) isn't that the very definition of an unconstitutional criminal law that only applies to one person, the political opponent of the governor?
as usual lionel hutz, plagiarized it from somewhere else,
What bothers me is the selective nature of the process instead of neutral discretion. The lack of publicized action regarding Mr. Paxton stands out. FHFA has the loan data. I’d be surprised if there isn’t already a dashboard tracking anomalies. With all the mortgages they oversee through Fannie and Freddie, it wouldn’t be hard to flag outliers like occupancy misrepresentation, sudden valuation jumps, or odd loan-to-value ratios. A neutral screen of public officials would surely turn up some on both sides.
My perception is that this case was pursued so aggressively only because of who Mr. Trump is. Same with mortgages, if you’re on the right side of the administration in power then no problem; if not, there you go. I just want principle to rule the day — maybe that makes me a dreamer.
they sent down the no 3 at justice, to cook up this stew if you recall (name escapes me)
Clay and Buck and the WSJ said Trump won.
This is not really new stuff. Governor Fife Symington of Arizona was indicted and hounded from office during the Clinton administration for a real estate deal gone bad. The lender was a union who refused to do an appropriate workout. Other Republican Senators and Governors have been lawfared out of office since then.
Poor Kaka on the wrong side of another losing case vs Trump. Now whining again.
next for shur (cue Bulwinkle,
Gilbar: The 34 felonies case was about paying off the nuisance case of the lady in a hotel room; this case was about the value of Mar a Largo in a real estate transaction.
Free advice to the Prez:
Divest your holdings and never do business in New York again.
NYT tricksters attack "fraudster".
Either way it was going to move on to NY Supreme Court.
Sure. But it's getting harder and harder to justify the case, isn't it? The Appeals Court is going to have to create quite the Byzantine pretzel to make it seem that justice was done in the original trial.
And also, Kak is full of it with the claim that "any small business owner" would have been prosecuted under this standard... since literally none has.
"That Case, also on Appeal, should also never have been brought, and he should be admonished for Abuse, and every other thing that can be thrown at a Corrupt Judge." Trump writes in a style Jefferson used in the Declaration of Independence.
I'm a lawyer, but criminal law is not my field. Apart from the merits (not that I think this case had any), what puzzles me is how this can be a civil case. The banks had no complaint, so they weren't suing. The state wasn't hurt and had no damages either. In criminal cases, of course, no one but the state need care. But if this had been a criminal case, Trump would have had various Constitutional protections that defendants in civil cases don't get. Can states, or for that matter the Feds, turn conduct they dislike that might be criminal into a civil case with financial and other penalties other than incarceration just by enacting a law that does that? That's what happens with things like traffic violations, but if they can do it across the board it would seem to be a way to evade the Constitutional protections for defendants in criminal cases.
#kakiswack
narciso said...
"they sent down the no 3 at justice, to cook up this stew if you recall (name escapes me)"
________________
I think you are referring to Matthew Colangelo.
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