United States: Supreme Court forces Donald Trump to file tax returns
The highest court in the United States has authorized the transmission to the New York prosecutor of the archives of several years of tax returns of the former president, raising fears to the latter of a possible indictment.
Acquitted by the Senate for his second impeachment procedure, Donald Trump is far from done with business. The Supreme Court on Monday rejected a new attempt by the former president to avoid handing over his accounting records to a New York prosecutor, allowing the latter to continue his investigations against the former president which put him at risk, in the long term, an indictment.
Asked by lawyers for the ex-New York tycoon, the Supreme Court refused to overturn a federal judge's decision who had ordered the delivery of eight years of tax and banking returns to Manhattan prosecutor Cyrus Vance, who has been asking for them for months.
An investigation initially focused on other facts
The Supreme Court had already ordered Donald Trump in July 2020 to transmit these documents to the prosecutor, but the lawyers for the magnate had re-requested it to contest the scope of the documents requested. "The work continues," Cyrus Vance simply responded in a statement.
Initially focused on payments made, before the 2016 presidential election, to two alleged mistresses of the billionaire, the investigation by Cyrus Vance, investigated behind closed doors before a grand jury, now also examines possible allegations of tax fraud, insurance fraud, or bank fraud.
Michael Cohen, former Trump lawyer, questioned again
According to US media, investigators recently interviewed employees of Deutsche Bank - long the financial backer of Donald Trump and his holding company, the Trump Organization - and his insurance company, Aon.
They also re-interviewed the president's former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, who is serving a prison sentence. He had told Congress that Trump and his company were artificially inflating or reducing the value of their assets, to alternately obtain bank loans or reduce their taxes.
Risk of incarceration of the former president
If these suspicions were true and Cyrus Trump was indicted, they would expose the ex-president to possible imprisonment. Unlike federal offenses, violations of state laws cannot be pardoned by the President of the United States.
New York State Democratic Attorney Letitia James is also investigating the allegations of bank fraud and insurance fraud, in civil proceedings.
Donald Trump did not immediately react to the Supreme Court's decision on Monday. But in the past he has called the investigation "the worst witch hunt in US history." Unlike his predecessors, the real estate developer and ex-reality TV star, who left New York for good to move to his club in Mar-a-Lago, Florida, never released his tax returns. .
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