Published December 13, 2023
- The Trump fraud trial is nearing its end in a lower Manhattan courthouse.
- More than 10 weeks of testimony wrapped on Wednesday with a verdict expected in a month.
- Four hours after testimony ended, someone set a small fire outside the courtroom.
Four hours after testimony wrapped in the civil-fraud trial against Donald Trump and the Trump Organization, the lower Manhattan courthouse was evacuated after someone set papers on fire and then used multiple fire extinguishers on the same floor as the courtroom.
The judge in the case, New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron, was in his robing room when he heard shouting on the floor. He was safely escorted out of the courthouse.
The judge was unaware of any specific personal threat at the time he evacuated.
Two courthouse officials told Business Insider the evacuation was prompted by a man creating a small fire by igniting paperwork and then setting off two or more fire extinguishers. The man, who was not identified and was not a courthouse employee, was arrested, they said.
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SOURCE: www.businessinsider.com
RELATED: Trump’s lawyers again ask for early verdict, judge says ‘no way’
Former President Donald Trump, center, sits at the defense table with his attorney’s Christopher Kise, left, and Alina Habba, at New York Supreme Court, Thursday, Dec. 7, 2023, in New York. AP FILE PHOTO
Published December 13, 2023
NEW YORK — Donald Trump’s lawyers rested his defense Tuesday and sought anew to immediately end the New York civil fraud trial that threatens the former president’s real estate empire. The judge said “there’s no way I’m going to grant that.”
Trump’s lawyers — thwarted in a similar bid last month — were swatted down as they asked Judge Arthur Engoron to cut the trial short and issue a verdict clearing Trump, his company and top executives of wrongdoing. The judge reiterated his feeling that state lawyers had met their legal burden for seeing the three-month trial through to its conclusion.
“You’d be wasting your time, but I’m not going to tell you not to send me something,” Engoron told Kise. But, he warned, “It doesn’t mean I’ll entertain” or even read the written request.
State lawyer Kevin Wallace complained the long-shot bid — essentially an academic exercise given Engoron’s position on the matter — was a “colossal waste of resources.”
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SOURCE: www.newsinfo.inquirer.net
RELATED: Judge Engoron Admits He Will Miss Trump
Published December 13, 2023
Amid final testimony in Donald Trump‘s civil fraud trial, Judge Arthur Engoron, who is overseeing the case, admits on Wednesday he will “miss this trial”.
Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, has been civilly sued by New York Attorney General Letitia James for $250 million. In her lawsuit, James alleges that Trump, his adult sons, and top executives at The Trump Organization conspired to increase his net worth by billions of dollars on financial statements provided to banks and insurers to make deals and secure loans. Trump has denied any wrongdoing and has called the trial politically motivated. While the former president abruptly decided not to take the stand in his defense on Monday, Trump’s lawyers rested his defense on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, as final testimony in the case wrapped up with Eric Lewis, an accounting professor at Cornell University, Engoron admitted he would miss the trial.
“In a strange way, I am going to miss this trial. It has been an experience,” Engoron said according to ABC News reporter Peter Charalambous.
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SOURCE: www.Newsweek.com
