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re: Fraud Trial DAY 1-TRUMP Attacked Judge & Prosecutor in What Could End His Empire
Man Charged With Leaking Donald Trump Tax Returns
Leaked TRUMP Tax Return Showed HUGE $916m FALSE Loss
BBC 30 SEP 2023
A man in the US has been charged with leaking the tax returns of a "high-ranking government official" who is understood to be Donald Trump.
Prosecutors said Charles Littlejohn, a contractor for the IRS - the US-wide tax body - stole the information and passed it on to a news organisation.
He is also accused of stealing tax return information of "thousands" of the US's "wealthiest individuals".
The Department of Justice alleges this data was given to another outlet.
Court documents say the two news organisations published "numerous articles" based on this information.
Neither have been charged with any wrongdoing.
Although the court documents do not name the government official, a source has confirmed to the BBC's partner in the US, CBS News, that it is former president Donald Trump.
The same person also said that the news organisation which received information about Mr Trump's tax returns was The New York Times, while the second, which received information about other individuals was the ProPublica website.
The New York Times declined to comment to CBS News about the claims, while ProPublica said in a statement to the outlet: "We have no comment on today's announcement from the DoJ. As we've said previously, ProPublica doesn't know the identity of the source who provided this trove of information on the taxes paid by the wealthiest Americans."
There has been no public comment from Mr Trump.
Court documents claim that between 2017 and 2021, Mr Littlejohn worked for an unnamed consultancy which in turn worked on contracts from the US Department of the Treasury's IRS, dealing with tax administration.
The papers go on to allege that between 2018 and 2020, while Mr Littlejohn was working on an IRS contract "he stole tax returns and return information", some of which dated back more than 15 years.
The charge against Mr Littlejohn is the unauthorised disclosure of tax returns and return information. If convicted, he faces up to five years in prison. There has been no public comment from the Washington DC resident.
A 2020 article in The New York Times, which is thought to have been based on the leaked information, claimed that Mr Trump paid just $750 (£580) in federal income tax both in 2016, the year he ran for the US presidency, and in his first year in the White House.
The newspaper also said that he paid no income taxes at all in 10 of the previous 15 years and that the records reveal "chronic losses and years of tax avoidance".
RELATED:
TRUMP Fraud Ruling That Cancels His Business Licenses is a Devastating Blow For Ex-President
The Glitzy New York Buildings That TRUMP Could Lose
BBC 30 SEP 2023
Long before Donald Trump stepped into the White House, his glitzy and glamorous real estate empire helped make him a nationally recognised star.
Now, a judge's ruling that his business committed massive fraud has thrown the fate of some of the former president's flagship properties into doubt.
On Tuesday, Judge Arthur Engoron ordered that some of Mr Trump's companies be removed from his control.
Mr Trump has denied any wrongdoing and is expected to appeal.
The ruling was part of a lawsuit filed against Mr Trump and his family by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who asked the judge for a summary decision that certain facts in the case were beyond dispute in the hope of speeding up the impending trial.
It severely limits Mr Trump's ability to do business in New York, the place where he launched the real estate empire that thrust him into the national spotlight.
What the ruling means for Mr Trump's properties, however, remains uncertain.
The Trump Organization could be forced to hand over control to a court-appointed receiver, or ultimately have to sell some of its most iconic landmarks. Mr Trump's lawyers have asked for more clarity on which properties could be affected. The judge has yet to give a definitive answer.
For Mr Trump, the stakes are potentially high. Earlier this year, Forbes estimated that his New York properties alone are worth $720m (£589m), a sizable chunk of his estimated $2.5bn fortune.
Let's take a look at some of the properties that Mr Trump might lose.
Trump Tower
Located on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, the 58-floor Trump Tower is among the most recognisable properties bearing Mr Trump's name.
The building is the headquarters of the embattled Trump Organization and has been home to Mr Trump and several of his family members.
The building - which was developed by Mr Trump and inaugurated in 1983 - has also featured prominently in popular culture, including serving as the location for Batman's Wayne Enterprises in Christopher Nolan's 2012 film The Dark Knight Rises.
Mr Trump's penthouse condominium that spans the top three floors of the building is also among the properties highlighted in James' lawsuit.
The lawsuit alleges that Mr Trump artificially inflated the triplex's value, by repeatedly saying it was more than 30,000 sq ft (2,790 sq m) in size, significantly larger than the 11,000 sq ft listed in property records.
The penthouse was valued at$327m in 2015, a price that the lawsuit called "absurd".
"Tripling the size of the apartment for purposes of the valuation was intentional and deliberate fraud," the lawsuit reads. "Not an honest mistake".
40 Wall Street
Originally completed in 1930, the 72-story neo-Gothic tower in the heart of New York's financial district was purchased by a Trump-controlled company in 1995. The building's website proudly boasts that the purchase was "one of the great real estate deals of all time".
Since the purchase, the building's tenants have included global giants such as American Express, defunct investment bank Bear Stearns and Hilton Hotels & Resorts.
In the New York lawsuit, prosecutors alleged that the values given by Mr Trump and the Trump Organization "far exceeded the values determined by professionals" in lender-ordered appraisals.
In 2012, for example, the property was valued by the company at $572m in financial statements - more than twice the value reached by the outside appraisals.
By early this year, the building had been added to a lender watchlist because of concerns over rising expenses and vacancies, according to Bloomberg.
Seven Springs Estate
Vaunted as "one of the most prestigious private estates" by the Trump Organization, the verdant 212-acre estate stretches across the towns of Bedford, Armonk and Chappaqua in New York's Westchester Country. It was built in 1919 by former Washington Post publisher Eugene Meyer and bought by the Trump Organization in 1996.
A large Georgian-style mansion surrounded by nature preserves, the property is atypical of Mr Trump's holdings, which tend to sparkle and shine with gold-plated décor.
As is the case with the other properties in the lawsuit, the Trumps are accused of overvaluing the estate.
Mr Trump's son Eric is also accused of pushing for developments there that were not approved and "not feasible", as well as hiding the estate's true value and fraudulently increasing the value of tax deductions stemming from it.
Mar-a-Lago
It is unclear whether Judge Engoron's ruling would apply to Trumps' Mar-a-Lago estate
The extent of Judge Engoron's recent ruling is still unclear, but could potentially extend far beyond New York's borders to properties that controlled by New York based limited liability companies, or LLCs.
This could reportedly include Mr Trump's famous 17-acre Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, where he currently resides.
In his ruling, Mr Engoron determined that Mr Trump inflated the value of Mar-a-Lago by as much as 2,300%.
The ruling cited an appraisal from the Palm Beach County Assessor's office, which placed the property's value at between $18m and $27.6m.
The valuation sparked an angry response from Mr Trump, who called Mr Engoron "unhinged" and a "political hack judge".
On X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, Eric Trump speculated that Mar-a-Lago is worth a billion dollars, "making it arguably the most valuable residential property in the country".
His brother Donald Trump Jr mocked the assessment writing: "If Mar-a-Lago is worth $18 million... I'll take 10 please!!"
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