NEW YORK — Prosecutors charged the Trump Organization with a 15-year "scheme to defraud" the government and charged its chief financial officer with grand larceny and tax fraud in a Manhattan courtroom Thursday afternoon.
Allen Weisselberg, former president Donald Trump's longtime CFO, pleaded not guilty during a brief arraignment hearing that began about 2:20 p.m. He walked into the courtroom in a dark suit, surrounded by detectives and court officers. He did not respond to questions from reporters in the hallway outside.
Weisselberg, 73, had surrendered at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office early Thursday, the morning after a grand jury filed indictments against him and the Trump Organization.
Weisselberg was released after the hearing, but he was required to surrender his passport after prosecutors said he was a "flight risk."
An attorney for the Trump Organization also pleaded not guilty on the company's behalf. Prosecutors also charged a subsidiary called Trump Payroll Corporation, which handles the company's benefits and payments to employees.
In all, 15 criminal charges filed against Weisselberg, according to a copy of the indictment obtained by The Washington Post. They included counts of conspiracy, criminal tax fraud and falsifying business records. In many of the counts, the two Trump entities were charged along with Weisselberg.
Carey Dunne, a prosecutor with the District Attorney's Office, said in the hearing that the charges related to an "off-the-books tax fraud scheme" that lasted for 15 years. He said that the scheme allowed Trump Organization executives to get "secret pay raises" while not paying proper taxes.
"To put it bluntly, this was a sweeping and audacious illegal payment scheme," Dunne said. He rejected an allegation from the Trump Organization that the charges were part of a politiclly-motivated effort to hurt Trump: "It's not about politics," Dunne said.
Trump Organization attorney Alan Futerfas said he would not respond to the allegations in the hearing.
"I appreciate the news release and I don't think at this point it warrants a response," he said, referring to Dunne's comments.
An attorney for Weisselberg, Mary E. Mulligan, said only that her side disputes the facts of the case.
These are the first charges to result from an investigation of Trump's company by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. (D) and New York Attorney General Letitia James (D). Both Vance and James were present in the courtroom for the arraignment, sitting one seat apart to observe social-distancing rules.
Weisselberg arrived at the Manhattan criminal courthouse through an employee entrance at about 6:20 a.m., according to journalists who saw him enter. His attorney, Mary E. Mulligan, confirmed the surrender in a text to The Washington Post.
“Mr. Weisselberg intends to plead not guilty and he will fight these charges in court,” Mulligan said in a statement sent on behalf of Weisselberg from herself and co-counsel Bryan C. Skarlatos.
The Trump Organization, in a statement, lauded Weisselberg as “a loving and devoted husband, father and grandfather who has worked at the Trump Organization for 48 years.”
“He is now being used by the Manhattan District Attorney as a pawn in a scorched earth attempt to harm the former President. The District Attorney is bringing a criminal prosecution involving employee benefits that neither the IRS nor any other District Attorney would ever think of bringing,” the statement said. “This is not justice; this is politics.”
Trump, in an interview Wednesday night from Texas — where he appeared at a presidential-style event with Fox News host Sean Hannity — lumped the New York investigations with other past probes that he has insisted have been politically motivated.
“All nonsense,” he said. “New York radical-left prosecutors come after me — you gotta fight.”
Prosecutors had declined to comment about the indictments Wednesday.
Although the indictments could pose trouble for Trump, exposing his company to potential fines and intensifying pressure on Weisselberg, neither the former president nor anyone else in his firm is expected to face charges this week. Prosecutors hope Weisselberg will offer testimony against Trump in exchange for lessening his own legal risk, according to a person familiar with the case.
Weisselberg, who has worked for Trump since the 1980s, is considered the most important figure in the Trump Organization apart from Trump family members. The Washington Post has previously reported that Weisselberg was a key figure in the investigations by Vance and James. Both have scrutinized whether Trump misled lenders or tax authorities, or evaded taxes on forgiven debts or fringe benefits for employees, according to court papers and people familiar with the cases.
In recent months, both sets of investigators have spoken to Jennifer Weisselberg, the chief financial officer’s former daughter-in-law, who said that Weisselberg’s son Barry had been given a free apartment and a hefty salary while he worked at the Trump Organization’s Central Park ice rink. Prosecutors were looking into whether taxes were paid on the benefits, people close to the investigation said.
The now-merged investigations of Trump’s company appear to be the longest-lasting and most extensive prosecutorial examination ever undertaken of the Trump Organization.
Vance’s office opened an investigation in 2018, responding to former Trump attorney Michael Cohen’s charges that Trump had directed improper payoffs during the 2016 presidential campaign to women who said they had affairs with Trump.
But Vance’s probe then broadened, encompassing years of business transactions. Vance examined tax breaks that Trump got on an estate in suburban New York, loans Trump took out on his Chicago tower, and statements Trump made to New York tax authorities about the value of his Manhattan towers, according to previous court filings.
Vance did not seek reelection this year; that means the bulk of the case against Trump’s company could be handled by Vance’s successor.
Trump and his organization have never faced criminal charges, but Trump has been the target of lawsuits from the office of the New York attorney general.
In one, he was sued for allegedly defrauding students at Trump University, a case that ended with Trump paying a $25 million settlement in 2016 in that and other cases. Two yeas later, Trump was sued for misusing money in a charity he controlled; a judge ordered Trump to pay damages of $2 million.
An earlier version of this article misspelled Letitia James’s first name as Leticia. The article has been corrected.
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