Manafort Trial Delayed as Jury Selection Begins

who really is a nice man? You look at what's going on with him. It's like al Capone two thousand and five tax case on a case that I guess it's just a sad thing. It's a very sad thing for our country to say this joining us. He as former federal prosecutor Robert Mintz, head of the criminal investigations in White Color Practice at McCarter and English. Bob, I don't know whether comparing someone to a gangster evokes much sympathy, but it is the case against Manafort for tax and

bank fraud, similar to the case against Capone for tax evasion. Well, June, I think it's more complicated than that. In this case. Manafort is accused of making tens of millions of dollars while working for former pro Russia Ukrainian President of Victor Yana Kovic and his party, and then concealing those earnings and the offshore bank accounts that held them from U S authorities. He's also charged with misleading lenders about his finances to induce them to make twenty million dollars in

loans to him. So I think what we're going to see in this case is a is a case that is very heavy in terms of documents, and it's really going to be a follow the documents, follow the money type of prosecution. The prosecutors have listed more than four exhibits for trial, but they appear to be trying to ensure that it's not just going to be a boring trial of bank records and business contract and tax returns. Tell us about some of the things they have in mind. Well,

any good prosecution has to involve a narrative. It's not simply getting up there and reeling off a series of documents and asking the jurors to connect the dots themselves.

So I think what we can expect here is that prosecutors are going to paint this tale of Mantifort making tens of millions of dollars as this unregistered agent for Ukraine, than steering the money into these offshore accounts in countries around the globe, than using that money to buy houses, cars, expensive clothing and jewelry, and ultimately lying to US authorities and to banks about what he earned with his wealth. It's basically a case that involves tax evasion and bank fraud.

And part of that case will allow prosecutors to show photographs of houses and jewelry, expensive renovations that were done on various properties that Mantifort owned out in the Hampton's and in Brooklyn and in other locations, and so he they're going to show not only how he earned his money, how he concealed the money, but then ultimately that he used that money for his own personal benefit, to show that he in fact owned the money, that he controlled it,

and he should have reported on his taxes but failed to do so. Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. Well, in light of all the evidence that prosecutors seem to have,

what kind of defense might Manafort put up. Well, Manaford has an experienced legal team, and he apparently has the financial wherewithal to attack the government's case because he's done so very aggressively so far, so I think we can expect to see prosecutors, I'm sorry, I expect that we can expect to see his defense lawyers going after the government's case in a in a very aggressive way of continuing on the path that they've already started here, which

will mean really attacking the key points in the government's case, which is manafort state of mind, the government's requirement that they show that he controlled those offshore accounts, and the history of off short income. Part of the government's case is going to be a reliance on his one time right hand man, Rick Gates, and some of those accounts were set up by Gates. The government's going to argue that Manafort was aware that those accounts were set up

and that he'd benefited from those accounts. But clearly the defense is going to attack Gates's credibility, and the defense has at least something to work with because Gates, in pleading guilty, acknowledged that he failed to report uh income, that he used three million dollars from offshore accounts for his own mortgages, and his children's tuition and interior decorating, and Gates was without or without any doubt central to this case. He opened up fifty five accounts allegedly with

thirteen financial institutions over a dozen years. So the defense is going to have some opportunity to attack Gates his credibility and in doing so try to distance their client from these crimes and show that he did not have the state of mind to conceal these assets from the government and was not guilty of the charges that the

government has brought against him. But when I asked you about one thing, which is the prosecutors gave Manaforts lawyers twenty thousand documents this month, and that's why the judge granted the defense request to push back the trial a week. The prosecutors had the late handover of documents wouldn't affect Manaforts defense because the only new material was photographs and images.

Is that late timing suspicious in any way as sort of game playing, Well, I don't really think it's suspicious, because it's not unusual for the government to continue to be investigating right up to the day of trial. But I also think that it was quite predictable that the judge is going to give some additional time because merely because prosecutors are saying that this evidence is not relevant, um doesn't mean that it might not be relevant to

the defense. Like the defense really doesn't have to take prosecutors words for it that there could not be some exculpatory information in those documents. And a good defense lawyer is going to be familiar with all the documents that they have in their possession through discovery. So what the judge did here is split the baby in a sense. Because the defense had asked for a longer adjournment, trying to push this trial back beyond the other trial that's

scheduled in September. The judge refused to do that, but he did give them an extra week to go through these documents that they just received within the last month. Only about a minute, your Bob. But this will be the first court test for the Special Council's team. So even though it's on bank fraud and tax charges, how important is the result here to the Special Council? It's enormously important. I can't imagine a case where the stakes

are higher. Obviously, the credibility of this investigation has been attacked by the president has been attacked by other people in Congress and other interest groups. Um, Robert Mueller has to show that he is doing his job, that this is not uh, simply a phishing expedition, and so uh it's absolutely critically important for the credibility of this special helpful investigation that they make some of these charges stick. And it's going to be the defense's job to try

to make sure that doesn't happen. All Right, Bob, thanks so much. That's Robert Mint's partner at McCarter in English. Last karate, MGM Resorts sued the victims of the shooting at its Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas in October, using an anti terrorism law that could wipe out its liability for what was the worst mass shooting in US history. It didn't take long for the hashtag boycott MGM Resorts

to appear on Twitter. Katherine Lombardo, a lawyer for some of the shooting victims, says, the lawsuit is a trick. This was not a terrorist attack. This was negligence on the on behalf of MGM. They're trying to hide behind the Safety Act. Joining me is Thomas Russell, a professor at the Strum College and of Law at the University of Denver, Thomas Many tell us about the law MGM is basing its laws Sudan called the Support Anti Terrorism

by Fostering Technologies Act or the Safety Act. UM. First, thanks for having me on, and I do have to correct you. It's Sturm College of Law and not Strum and we get that all the time, but I just I'm monitor bound to make that correction. UM. So this act is an act and that you know, put in

place by Congress about fifteen years ago. UM. It bears sort of elements of anti terrorism and also elements of Torque reform and kind of combines both of those together and makes it more difficult to sue someone who has UM hired somebody who's deployed a technology that is supposed

to be an anti terrorism technology. UM. And so the claim UM by MGM is that they should be able to shift liability from themselves or more likely from their insurers to the insurance company for Contemporary Services Corporation, which did the security work on the ground below the Mandalais Bay Hotel. So this is the first time I believe

that this law is being used. So there's no pressing to follow, but there do seem to be some hurdles, one being that perhaps a security company was protected under the law, but MGM hasn't gone through the process that the firm did to get certification under the Act. Well, I actually think that my reading again, as you say, it's correct that there hasn't been adjudication under this statute. So in fact, we don't really know what it means, and it will take some some time before we figure

that out. Um. My reading of the statute and the related regulations are that the company creates a technology which can include maybe a service to that is the designed to prevent some form of mass attack, and then when another entity hires that company, the liability should something go wrong shifts to the to the entity providing the technology, the anti anti terrorism technology. So there are a set of steps of approval through the Department of Homeland Security

that the that the security company would have gone through. Um, it's a little less clear to me exactly what MGM would have gone through that. An important thing to note here is that there's a lot of loss, of course, from injuries, death, from emotional harm, everything else. One of the things that the statute does is narrows the think the amount of money that can be recovered for a variety of things. This the act eliminates punitive damages, for example,

it narrows the recovery of economic harm for emotional loss. Um, it narrows eliminates something related to health insurance essentially is what it does. Um. And And at the same time, the Act limits the recovery to the total amount of insurance that the security contractor has. So it's significant goal. Yeah, go ahead. So UM, now they're asking for the court

to declare the company isn't liable at all. Um. Is there any problem with the victims claims that MGM was negligent and that there were red flags about the shooter that the hotel should have picked up on, such as piling up weapons in his room where the hotel hired the security company for the concert itself. So I'm not sure if any of that crosses well. I agree with you there, and I'd need to see more of the pleadings and some of the lawsuits that were filed and

then subsequently withdrawn. But to simplify, I can conceive of an activity on the ground and there may have been negligence in relationship to that and to the music the music festival, and then separately negligence in the hotel. And I'm not saying it was negligent, but perhaps negligence in the hotel in allowing the number of bags to come in and that sort of stuff, although frankly, I'm not

sure I want hotels counting my baggage. So it may be that if this act protects MGM, it could be that it protects him only on the ground, but not for what they did in their hotel. Right, MGM does own both the festival and the hotel, but they own them separately through a through a complicated corporate structure that I don't fully comprehend. Okay um, So many critics are calling out this lawsuit as outrageous, disgraceful, and worse. Did it shock you that MGM would use this legal maneuver

so to speak? Now, I'm not shocked, and honestly, I mean it maybe seems a little premature to seek a declaratory judgment. On the other hand, they've got people who either filed suit and then withdrew it or said they're going to sue them. It makes sense to consolidate these somewhere and I think that what is likely is that this is all going to be consolidated within one federal courthouse somewhere in the United States, and and who knows

where that will be. Um, you know, it may feel shocking. Um, it's a little bit novel, but it's it shouldn't be shocking that an entity that faces a lot of liability wants to limit that liability and push that liability to others if they can do some And MGM spokeswoman said the federal court is an appropriate venue in the best and fastest way to resolve the cases. Will you explain why MGM and most corporations want cases to be tried in federal court and plaintiffs and most victims would rather

have it in state court. Well, I think the simple truth of the matter is, and I should add here to that, I'm a law professor, but also practice law on the side of plaineiffs, so that's generally where my sympathies lie. But in this case, you know, I'm trying to give it to you as straight as I can.

The truth of the matter is, the federal judges in our country are the best, are the best judges that we have, and the federal courts of the are the most efficient and effective courts that we have, and it's going to help a party to be able to consolidate in one, as I said, in one court or you know, one set of courts, rather than to have to litigate in a number of different states, between the number of different judges in front of whom who are who are

elected or appointed in a variety of different ways. So um, the best judges you can get are in the United States District Court. All right, Thanks so much for being on the show. That's Thomas Russell. He's a professor at the Stern College of Law at the University of Denver. Thanks for listening to the Blue Burg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso. This is Bloomberg