Donald Trump Faces Final Moments in Civil Fraud Trial Amid Security Scare

Donald Trump Faces Final Moments in Civil Fraud Trial Amid Security Scare: Donald Trump showed up for closing arguments in his New York civil fraud trial on Thursday, but not before police reacted to a bomb threat at the judge’s home. This week, the judge moved to stop the former president from giving his own final statements.

A court source said that police went to Judge Arthur Engoron’s home on Long Island because of the threat. The events did not run late.

Donald Trump Faces Final Moments in Civil Fraud Trial Amid Security Scare

Trump, who is currently the front-runner for the Republican presidential ticket, has said many bad things about the judge in the case. On Wednesday night, he accused the judge on social media of working together with the New York attorney general “to screw me.” “At this moment the judge is not letting me make the summation because I’ll bring up things he doesn’t want to hear,” Trump said as he walked into the courtroom, characterising the move as “political meddling.” He said, “This case should have never been brought.”

Trump said he still hoped he would be able to speak, but his lawyer didn’t bring it up before starting his own final point.

Nassau County police said they were called to Engoron’s home in Great Neck at 5:30 a.m. on Thursday, hours before the last day of the trial was set to start. There had been a “swatting incident.” Officials said that nothing wrong was found at the scene.

A few days before, a fake 911 call said there was a shooting at the home of the judge in Washington, D.C., who is in charge of Trump’s Capitol attack criminal case. In the past few days, there have been a lot of similar false stories about public leaders’ houses.

Engoron didn’t talk about what happened at home when he got to the bench a few minutes late.

Engoron turned down Trump’s unusual plan to give his own closing remarks in court along with summaries from his lawyers on Wednesday. This was because Trump’s lawyers wouldn’t agree to the judge’s demand that he stick to “relevant” matters, so the lawyers were left with the last words in a trial over claims that Trump lied about his wealth on financial statements he gave to banks, insurance companies, and others.

“Forty-four days of trial — not one witness came into this courtroom, your honour, and said there was fraud,” Trump lawyer Christopher Kise said.

Letitia James, the Democratic Attorney General of New York, wants the judge to fine the company USD 370 million. Trump says he didn’t do anything wrong. He says that the outside accountants who helped him make the statements should have found any problems and that the papers had disclaimers that protect him from paying for anything.

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The former president wanted to make that case in person, but the judge said no after a Trump lawyer missed a deadline for agreeing to ground rules. The judge had been open to the idea at first. Engoron warned Trump that he couldn’t “deliver a campaign speech” or use the chance to attack the judge and his staff in his final comments.

“This entire case is a manufactured claim to pursue a political agenda,” Kise said in his closing argument. “It has been press releases and posturing but no evidence.” Lawyers from James’ office will deliver their closing argument Thursday afternoon.

Trump went back to court on Thursday as an observer, even though his mother-in-law, Amalija Knavs, had died and the Iowa poll on Monday marked the start of the presidential primary season.

As of October 2, nine times, Trump has been to court to watch, speak, and complain about the case in front of TV cameras. He has called it a “witch hunt and a disgrace.” During his 3½ hours on the witness stand in November, he fought with Engoron and the state’s lawyers. He is still under a limited gag order after posting something bad and false about the judge’s law clerk on social media.

The points on Thursday are part of a busy time for Trump in politics and the law.

He was in court in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday to hear points from the appeals court about whether he can’t be charged with plotting to change the results of the 2020 election. This is one of four criminal cases that are being brought against him. Trump has said he is not guilty.

In 2022, James sued Trump under a state law that gives the attorney general of the state a lot of power to look into claims of ongoing business crime.

Engoron made some important decisions before the witnesses came in. He said before the trial that Trump had been guilty of years of fraud by lying about his wealth on financial documents by doing things like saying that his Trump Tower apartment was almost three times as big as it really was.

Six claims are still being argued in the trial. These include claims of plot, insurance theft, and falsifying business records.

There are also charges against Trump’s business and two of his sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. Eric Trump was also in court to hear the last few points.

James also wants Trump and his co-defendants to be banned from doing business in New York.

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Lawyers for the state say that Trump saved at least USD 168 million by making himself look richer, which helped him get better loan terms from banks.

Kise said that Trump had been “part of the fabric of the commercial real estate industry” for 50 years and pointed to Trump’s testimony that he wanted lenders to do their own study and checks after getting his financial documents.

He also said that the papers didn’t overstate the former president’s wealth, but rather showed that it was lower than it really was.

But Kise said, “there’s plenty of assets that were undervalued by substantial sums.” He also said that some holdings may have been put “higher by immaterial” amounts. Because neither side asked for a jury and because state law doesn’t allow them in this kind of case, Engoron said he would decide the case himself. He said he would make up his mind by the end of the month.

When the defense asked the judge to rule early last month, he turned it down. This showed that the judge thinks Trump and his co-defendants are likely guilty of at least some claims.

“Valuations, as elucidated ad nauseum in this trial, can be based on different criteria analyzed in different ways,” Engoron wrote in the December 18 ruling. ”But a lie is still a lie.”