XPost: nm.general, fl.politics, tn.general
XPost: stl.general
New York’s highest court has denied Manhattan District Attorney
Cy Vance’s effort to charge former President Donald Trump’s ex-
campaign manager Paul Manafort in a mortgage fraud case.
In the ruling handed down last week, Chief Judge Janet DiFiore
upheld the decision by a lower appeals court and by Judge
Maxwell Wiley, who both ruled that Vance’s attempt to charge
Manafort would violate double jeopardy.
Manafort was convicted of a fraud scheme in federal court and
sentenced to seven years in prison — but was pardoned by Trump
soon before he left office.
After Manafort was convicted, Vance announced het had been
charged in New York state court on a 16-count indictment,
alleging he had defrauded banks by lying to obtain mortgages on
four properties.
Judge Wiley struck down the attempt in a 26-page decision in
December, saying the case was too close to the federal charges
Manafort had already been prosecuted for.
“The People have failed to establish that the harm or evil each
statute is designed to prevent is very different in kind from
the federal statutes for which the defendant was previously
prosecuted,” Wiley wrote the decision.
Vance then appealed to the First Judicial Department of the
Appeals Court, which upheld Wiley’s decision.
Vance then appealed to the state’s highest court, leading to
Judge DiFiore’s Feb. 4 decision.
“As we have said from the time the District Attorney announced
charges against Mr. Manafort, this is a case that should never
have been brought because the dismissed indictment is a clear
violation of New York law,” Manafort’s attorney, Todd Blanche
said Monday.
“As the trial court held, and the Appellate Division affirmed,
the People’s arguments ‘fall far short’ of triggering an
exception to double jeopardy that would justify this
prosecution,” he added.
https://nypost.com/2021/02/08/cy-vances-case-against-manafort- dismissed-by-nys-highest-court/
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