During closing arguments in the Trump Organization tax-fraud trial on Friday, a Manhattan prosecutor accused Donald Trump of personallysanctioning tax fraud and suggested his side's star witness had financial incentive to lie.
Joshua Steinglass, one of two lead prosecutors, told jurors that the document shows that Mr. Trump is sanctioning tax fraud.
Steinglass was pointing to a 2012 internal company memo.
A decade ago, Trump signed his first initial, "D," and the word "OK" to approve an annual salary deduction for the company's COO.
You can read the whole memo here.
The prosecutor argued that Trump's "OK" shows he was aware of the tax dodge scheme at the center of the trial.
The 2005-2007 scheme allowed Trump's top executives to take chunks of their pay in the form of tax-free perks. In Calamari's case, the value of the perks was subtracted from the W-2 forms.
The defense insists that the Trump Organization shouldn't be held responsible for the scheme that started with Weisselberg.
The defense has argued that even though Trump signed off on the cars, apartments, bonuses, and other elements of the scheme, he wasn't aware that his executives were cheating on their taxes.
Defense lawyers objected when the prosecutor accused Trump of tax fraud.
The presiding judge of the trial, New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, sounded a bit frustrated.
The prosecution's "sanctioning tax fraud" claim was rejected by the judge due to a defense demand for a mis trial.
Steinglass said that the document showed that.
The judge told the lawyer to approach.
The judge told Steinglass not to go too far during the sidebar.
Steinglass said this is as far as he's going.
Don't offer this to put Donald Trump on trial, the judge told them. He isn't on trial.
The lawyer for the Trump Organization argued with Steinglass over who interrupted who more.
She told Josh to stop it. "Come on." How many times did you interrupt me? She said that he argued that Donald Trump was authorizing tax fraud.
The prosecutor insisted that the whole narrative that Donald Trump is ignorant is not true.
A spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney's office wouldn't say why Trump wasn't charged in the case.
Steinglass's strategy depended on him accusing Weisselberg of "shading the truth" on the stand.
New York law requires proof that executives intend to benefit their company. The company cannot be held responsible for the actions of its executives.
Weisselberg told jurors that he only intended to help himself when he masterminded the scheme. Steinglass implied that Weisselberg lied to protect his company's bottom line.
Steinglass told jurors that Weisselberg had half a million reasons to shade the truth to their side.
The former top money man who testified as part of a low-jail plea deal must get a $640,000 salary and $500,000 bonus this year if he wants to keep his job. Since October, Weisselberg has been on paid leave.
As part of a $250 million civil lawsuit filed by New York's attorney general, Trump has been accused of a longstanding pattern of fraud, though he has never been criminally charged.
Two subsidiaries of the Trump Organization, the Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corporation, were charged in the Manhattan case with tax fraud.
The jury deliberations are scheduled to start Monday. If the subsidiaries are found guilty, they will face up to $1.6 million in penalties.
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