At least one of Trump's four criminal trials is set to begin while the others are now in jeopardy
After five decades of playing fast and loose with the laws of New York, and a plenary of fraud, deception and corruption, legal appeasement seems to be declining and legal accountability seems to be ramping up as the proverbial hens are finally returning home to roost for the former Houdini of white-collar crime, Donald J. Trump.
First, there was the civil judgment of 5 million dollars awarded to the writer E. Jean Carroll by a federal jury of Trump’s peers. Then there was a second judgment of $83.3 million in damages awarded to Carroll by another jury of Trump’s peers for the additional defamatory statements that he continued to make after the first judgment was rendered for denying that he had sexually assaulted Carroll. And then there was the New York civil fraud decision by Judge Arthur Engoron holding Trump and his sons, Eric and Don, Jr. financially liable to the tune of more than $350 million underscoring “the extent of Trump and the Trump Organization’s white-collar malfeasance.” Last week, Judge Engoron turned down a request by Trump’s lawyers to postpone payment.
However, in the case of the historic $454 million judgment, “a figure that is growing by more than $100,000 in interest every day,” Trump sought a stay yesterday in opposition to New York law that requires first forking over the entire amount in damages or putting up a cash bond for the same known in the New York civil court system as an “undertaking.”
Trump also had previously done the same thing with the $83.3 million ruling by a jury in the second E. Jean Carroll defamation lawsuit. Neither of these appeals should go anywhere and the clock is still ticking in each case and soon time will be up before Carroll’s attorneys and then the New York attorney general Letitia James can start seizing the former president’s assets and property.