Thread by @ActOnDemocracy

#ManafortTrial Day 5:

Summary:

✅Manafort’s attorneys attempted to show that complicated finances resulted in unintentional errors & Gates was the criminal mastermind.

✅Testimony from senior special agent w/FINCEN, at Treasury.

✅Gates testified.

✅New clashes w/Judge.

1/6

#ManafortTrial Day 5 cont.

Laporta (CPA) testified:

✅Didn't go to Manafort re: Gates suspicions because: “it was [usually] clear Manafort was aware of what was going on.”

✅Knowing that income can’t be disguised as a loan doesn’t require expertise nor is it complicated.

2/6

#ManafortTrial Day 5 cont.

Paula Liss, certified fraud examiner/money laundering specialist testimony:

✅Judge limited scope to questions agreed to during sidebar.

✅Though required by law, neither Manafort nor his wife filed reports of foreign bank accounts from '11-'14.

3/6

#ManafortTrial Day 5 cont.

Rick Gates testified to conspiring with Manafort to:

✅Falsify tax documents.

✅Fail to report foreign bank accounts.

✅ Fail to register Manafort as a foreign agent.

4/6

#ManafortTrial Day 5 cont.

Rick Gates testimony:

✅Manafort paid millions by operatives in Ukraine for political/policy work via “shelf” companies in Cyprus.

✅Prosecutors questioned Gates on Rinat Akhmetov (present at #TrumpTower mtng) but we don’t have more details yet.

5/6

Clashes between prosecutors & Judge Ellis:

✅Mostly on relevance of Ukrainian backers’ motivations.

✅Prosecutor Andres: “[they’re unlike] Americans. [They’re] oligarchs & that means they control a segment of the economy based on the government’s allowing them to do that.”

6/6