(New York) The historic former financial director of Donald Trump’s real estate empire, Allen Weisselberg, who has already served time in prison for financial fraud, pleaded guilty Monday to perjury before the New York courts for having given false information related to the recent civil trial of the former US president.
Mr. Weisselberg, 76, who began working 50 years ago as an accountant for Donald Trump’s father and who was chief financial officer of the Trump Organization from 2005 to 2021, arrived in New York court handcuffed, according to journalists.
In the courtroom and according to a court document, he admitted to having lied during the investigation about the value of an apartment in the real estate group which brings together buildings, hotels and golf courses.
On February 16, Donald Trump was sentenced in civil court by the Supreme Court of New York to a $355 million fine (plus a hundred million dollars in interest) for financial fraud, for having illegally inflated the value of his real estate assets in order to obtain better loan and insurance conditions.
Prosecuted in this civil trial, just like Donald Trump and his two sons Eric and Donald Jr, Allen Weisselberg was sentenced to three years of ban from running a business in the State of New York and a lifetime ban from any function financial management in a company.
In 2023, in the criminal aspect of the Trump Organization affair, he pleaded guilty to fraud, served five months in prison and paid more than two million dollars in fines after the company had been sentenced to 1.6 million dollar fine.
PHOTO CURTIS MEANS, DAILY MAIL VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
Allen Weisselberg
For this new guilty plea, Mr. Weisselberg should only serve five months in prison while he faced seven years of imprisonment.
“It is simply a crime to lie during depositions and trials. Allen Weisselberg took an oath to tell the truth and then committed perjury,” said a spokesperson for the New York District Attorney for the borough of Manhattan.
In his guilty plea, Donald Trump’s former loyal lieutenant did not involve his former boss, who is due to appear in court on March 25 in another case, for the first time for a former president of the United States.
“Allen Weisselberg looks forward to putting this behind him,” his lawyer Seth Rosenberg said in a brief statement.