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Likely Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump will have to write another big check after he lost a civil fraud case in New York. A judge fined him $364 million and barred him from running any business in the state for three years.
During the three-month trial he was accused of inflating asset values in order to get better terms on loans.
“In order to borrow more and at lower rates, defendants submitted
blatantly false financial data to the accountants, resulting in
fraudulent financial statements,” presiding judge Arthur Engoron wrote. “When confronted at
trial with the statements, defendants’ fact and expert witnesses simply
denied reality, and defendants failed to accept responsibility or to
impose internal controls to prevent future recurrences.”
The case was littered with legal mistakes from Trump’s team.
He will surely appeal but under New York law he will be required to put up a large chunk of the damages in escrow.
In a separate case last year of sexual assault and defamation he lost and was fined $88.3 million.
He remains the betting favourite to be in the White House at this time next year.