3 Takeaways as Second Week of Manafort Trial Ends

The following article by Griffin Connolly was posted on the Roll Call website August 10, 2018:

Procedural hiccup pushed Friday’s start to middle of afternoon

The entrance to the US District Court in Alexandria, Va., where President Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, is standing trial is seen in a puddle on July 31. Credit: Sarah Silbiger, CQ Roll Call

The second week of the tax evasion and bank fraud trial of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is in the books with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s team expecting to call its final witness to the stand Monday afternoon. After that, the prosecution will rest its case.

After a procedural hiccup Friday morning that pushed the start of the day’s testimony to the middle of the afternoon, three of the prosecution’s witnesses took the stand to discuss the bank fraud charges against Manafort. Two employees from The Federal Savings Bank testified about a pair of loans Manafort secured from the bank in 2016. A ticket sales executive for the New York Yankees also testified.

Manafort is facing 18 counts of tax evasion and bank fraud and a maximum 305-year prison sentence if the Eastern Virginia jury finds him guilty.

View the complete article here.