The office of New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a letter on Tuesday that argued Trump should be banned from the real estate industry for life. James’s lawyers used the recent upholding of Martin Shkreli’s ban from the pharmaceutical industry to back their argument.
Ongoing trial
Trump, Donald Trump Jr, Eric Trump, and the Trump Organization are co-defendants in a $370 million civil fraud trial that James has been pursuing for years. The Trumps are accused by James of using “numerous acts of fraud and misrepresentation” over the years to get better loans.
Business vs crime
Trump’s attorneys have argued that any alleged inflated valuations were simply a result of the former president’s business acumen. However, Judge Arthur Engoron ruled that Trump’s valuations were “fraudulent.”
Lifetime ban
On Tuesday, a federal appeals court unanimously upheld so-called “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli’s lifetime ban from the pharmaceutical industry. James had prosecuted Shkreli using a New York law that allows courts to “issue a permanent and plenary ban in a particular industry.”
Appropriate ban
Shkreli was not just banned from the industry for life — he was ordered to pay a fine of over $64 million. The “Pharma Bro” had argued that a lifetime ban was an excessive restriction on his free speech.
Conviction
Shkreli was convicted of various offenses, including securities fraud, in 2018, and served five years before being released from prison early in 2022. When being sentenced, he apologized. “The only person to blame for me being here is me,” he said. “There is no government conspiracy to take down Martin Shkreli. I took down Martin Shkreli with my disgraceful and shameful actions.”
Criminal actions
Shkreli made headlines in 2015 for raising the price of Daraprim by 4,000%. The lifesaving drug is often prescribed to patients with HIV.
Required ban
“Given Shkreli’s pattern of past misconduct,” the appeals court ruled when upholding his lifetime ban, “the obvious likelihood of its recurrence, and the life-threatening nature of its results, we are persuaded that the district court’s determination as to the proper scope of the injunction was well within its discretion.”
Same for Trump
Colleen Faherty, a lawyer for James, told the court that a similar ruling should be applied to Trump. While Judge Engoron has already ruled that Trump and his co-defendants committed fraud by inflating the valuation of Trump’s properties, he still has to decide on six further accusations.
Pending decision
Judge Engoron has indicated that he aims to reach a decision by the end of January. The trial ended on January 11.
Chaos in the courtroom
Engoron repeatedly tussled with Trump and the former president’s lawyers. On the trial’s final day, Trump accused the judge of “having your own agenda” and said he “can’t listen for more than one minute.”
Maintaining control
“Please control your client,” Judge Engoron told Trump’s lawyer. Engoron allowed Trump to deliver a closing argument, telling the former president he had to stick to the facts. Instead, Trump attacked Engoron and repeated his claim that the trial is a “political witch hunt.”
Similar pattern
In Trump’s defamation trial, Judge Lewis A. Kaplan warned Trump that he could be ejected after the former president was heard muttering about the trial being a “con job” and “witch hunt.”
Not up to scratch
Trump’s lawyer in that trial, Alina Habba, fought with Judge Kaplan over a dozen times during the trial. “I make the rulings here, not the lawyers,” Kaplan admonished her at one point. “Sit down.”
Withering comments
At one point, Kaplan criticized Habba for attempting to read from a post that she hadn’t correctly entered as evidence. The judge called a break, advising Habba to use the time off to “refresh your memory about how it is you get a document into evidence.”
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