As part of the Russia investigation, special counsel Robert Mueller has filed new charges against former Trump campaign head Paul Manafort and his close associate Richard Gates.
The Hill reported that a federal court in Virginia on Thursday returned a 32-count superseding indictment charging Manafort and Gates with committing tax fraud, failing to file reports on foreign bank and financial accounts, and bank fraud conspiracy.
“Manafort and Gates generated tens of millions of dollars in income as a result of their Ukraine work,” the indictment says. “From approximately 2006 through the present, Manafort and Gates engaged in a scheme to hide income from United States authorities, while enjoying the use of the money.”
Last week, Mueller charged 13 Russian nationals, as well as three Russian entities responsible for orchestrating an elaborate scheme to interfere in the election using social media and other means. Meanwhile, Mueller managed to get a guilty plea from lawyer Alex Van Der Zwaan, who confessed to lying to FBI agents about his conversations with Gates about a 2012 report he had a hand in compiling for Ukraine’s government.
Also, there were rumors last week that Gates will accept a plea deal and will testify against Manafort for a reduced sentence. Mueller first charged Manafort and Gates in late October, but they have pleaded not guilty to those charges.
According to The Hill, the original 12-count indictment against Manafort and Gates, unsealed in October, detailed extensive allegations of financial crimes, including bank fraud and money laundering, linked to their work for pro-Russian political parties in Ukraine. However, the criminal charges are not linked to Manafort’s and Gates’s work during President Donald Trump’s campaign.
It is reported that more than $75 million flowed through Manafort’s and Gates’s offshore accounts. Manafort’s money laundering consists of more than $30 million concealed from the Treasury Department with Gates’s help. Mueller’s indictment also says Gates managed to get more than $3 million from the offshore accounts that he concealed from the government.
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