The Company Whose Lawyer Was at the Trump Tower Meeting Threatens To Break a Deal With the Feds
Source: Daily Beast
“My client has nothing to pay with! Everything else is restrained.”
KATIE ZAVADSKI
11.09.17 8:46 PM ET
Six months after settling a civil prosecution that touched Trump business associates and intersected with the death of a whistleblower who uncovered massive tax fraud in Russia, that company’s lawyer is now suggesting it may abandon the deal.
Prevezon Holdings attorney Faith Gay told Southern District Court Judge William H. Pauley III that the company still wants the six-month old deal, in which it agreed to pay $5.9 million without admitting guilt days before the case —alleging the company had used Manhattan real estate to launder some of the profits from the $230 million Russian tax scheme — was headed to trial. But, Gay said, there may be a fundamental disagreement between the company and the feds about their agreement that could undo it—“and maybe if there wasn’t a meeting of the minds, there is not a contract.”
Despite settling its civil case, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney Office reportedly has an outstanding criminal investigation into Prevezon’s alleged involvement with money laundering.
Under the terms of the civil settlement reached in May 2017, Prevezon had to pay the U.S. government $5.9 million within 15 business days of the U.S. asking Dutch authorities to release their hold on a $3 million transfer to Prevezon from another company.
Read more: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-company-whose-lawyer-was-at-the-trump-tower-meeting-threatens-to-break-a-deal-with-the-feds
= new reply since forum marked as read
Upon reading further, though...ohhhhhh: $230 million tax scheme. Is that the case Sergei Magnitsky was investigating when he was arrested, tortured and subsequently murdered by the Putin government?
And ohhhh - here's Bill Browder...
snip
Prevezon Holdings attorney Faith Gay told Southern District Court Judge William H. Pauley III that the company still wants the six-month old deal, in which it agreed to pay $5.9 million without admitting guilt days before the case —alleging the company had used Manhattan real estate to launder some of the profits from the $230 million Russian tax scheme — was headed to trial. But, Gay said, there may be a fundamental disagreement between the company and the feds about their agreement that could undo it—“and maybe if there wasn’t a meeting of the minds, there is not a contract.”
snip
In court filings, Prevezon’s lawyers cried foul over the timing of the Dutch investigation, saying it was tied to a complaint filed against Prevezon in the Netherlands by Browder the day after the settlement in the New York case was announced.
Browder has championed the Magnitsky Act, a 2012 law that sanctioned Russian human rights violators by limiting their access to the U.S. banking system. Other countries have followed suit, and the sanctions — which have harmed oligarchs closely tied to President Vladimir Putin, who’s aggressively pushed to undo them as — made Browder a prime target for acolytes of the Russian regime, who allege widespread collusion between Browder and prosecutors, and claim that he was the real financial criminal.
The funds frozen in the Netherlands belong to AFI Europe, a part of billionaire investor Lev Leviev’s Africa Israel Investments group. The Soviet-born diamond and real estate tycoon was who sold Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor, floors in the old New York Times building in 2015. This transaction is reportedly being reviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller because of Kushner’s swift and profitable refinancing of the project earlier this year.
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Ohhhh, and here's Robert Mueller....
Well, many thanks for posting, Judi Lynn!! And I'm so very glad there are people ever so much smarter than myself who know what this means and where it might lead - !!!
