[ad_1]
Special advocate team Robert Mueller called Paul Manafort a "bold" and "hardened" criminal in a new memo regarding unsealed probation on Saturday.
Manafort's conduct, even after pleading guilty to two federal crimes, "testifies to a stronger commitment to the commission of crimes and a lack of remorse," the prosecutor said, adding that he "violated the law repeatedly and shamelessly".
The note comes after US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled last week that Manafort had violated its plea agreement with Mueller by lying to prosecutors after agreeing to cooperate. Prosecutors were also angry when they learned last year that Manafort's lawyers informed President Donald Trump's legal team of all the questions put to him. The conduct was unusual, given that Trump is an accused in the investigation of Russia.
Saturday's note was public but contained several redactions. Prosecutors have not made a specific sentencing recommendation in the Manafort case, as has been the case so far, but they noted that the federal guidelines for the determination of the sentence provide for a sentence of 17 to 22 years imprisonment.
Read more:New York state attorneys would be preparing a criminal case against Manafort in case Trump would forgive him
Manafort and his longtime partner, Rick Gates, were indicted for the first time in October 2017 for several counts of money laundering, failure to register in as a foreign agent, failure to report foreign bank accounts and misrepresentations.
In February 2018, Manafort was accused of tax and banking fraud related to its political advisory and lobbying activities with the Ukrainian government and pro-Russian interests in the region. In June 2018, Manafort and former Russian intelligence agent Konstantin Kilimnik were indicted with additional charges of obstructing justice and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Manafort was facing two trials for the charges against him. But after a jury found him guilty under eight counts during his first trial in Virginia, the former Trump campaign president reached an agreement with prosecutors and pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy and obstruction.
After agreeing to cooperate, prosecutors learned that Manafort had lied to them about several interactions and events examined as part of the investigation into Russia.
Read more:The 2 reasons why Paul Manafort would lie to prosecutors and risk life imprisonment
Manafort's lawyers argued that Manafort's statements were false and that any misrepresentations were not made intentionally, but Jackson finally decided that Manafort's conduct constituted a violation of his plea agreement and therefore nullified its agreement with the special advocate.
In their sentencing note, prosecutors wrote that not only did Manafort engage in criminal behavior leading to his first indictment, but that his actions "remarkably continued unabated, even after the Charge d'accusation ".
"The sentence in this case must take into account the gravity of this behavior and serve both to deter Manafort in a specific way and, in general, to deter those who would commit a series of similar crimes," says the memo.
"Manafort may be rethinking his decision to violate his plea agreement now"
Manafort's conduct after entering into a plea agreement with Justice Department veterans puzzled by Mueller, said that many of them claimed that he would have a good chance of getting a sentence. reduced if he had fully cooperated and respected the terms of the agreement.
The experts told INSIDER that there were only a handful of reasons that could explain the actions of Manafort.
The first, they said, was that he was asking for a presidential pardon. Trump, for his part, publicly sympathized with Manafort, even as the White House had distanced himself from the former campaign president.
But getting a pardon may not be so simple.
With the 2020 presidential election and a House of Representatives headed by a Democratic party, "Trump knows that a pardon Manafort is politically risky at the moment and will only precipitate the debate on dismissal," Jens David Ohlin, Vice Dean of Cornell Law School who is an expert in criminal law, told INSIDER.
"Ironically, Manafort's best hope is for Trump to lose the 2020 elections and then forgive Manafort for leaving the White House," he added.
Even then, it seems that Manafort did not get out of the woods. This week, Bloomberg News announced that New York prosecutors were preparing a criminal case against Manafort in case Trump would forgive him.
The Constitution gives the president the power to forgive federal crimes, but not state crimes.
Following Bloomberg's report, a former senior justice official who worked closely with Mueller did not mince his words, explaining to INSIDER: "Manafort may be rethinking his decision to violate his plea contract now "
[ad_2]
Source link