Trump fraud trial defence witness was paid nearly $900,000 for testimony

by theindependentonline

37 comments
  1. In his deposition, Mr Bartov said he was initially tapped as an expert witness to talk about “generally accepted accounting principles,” the guidelines for crafting statements of financial condition that are at the centre of the case. He said he was “not really familiar” with those guidelines.

    Read the full story here: [https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/eli-bartov-trump-civil-fraud-trial-b2461066.html](https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/eli-bartov-trump-civil-fraud-trial-b2461066.html)

  2. Let me guess…

    With illegally-obtained campaign funds laundered through an offshore shell company that employs undisclosed off-balance sheet assets to wash money for fentanyl-manufacturing child traffickers?

  3. Tobacco company is used to use this one simple trick where they would bring in an “expert” to refute the allegation that smoking was bad for your health.

  4. He has some real credentials, and transcripts of his testimony were really interesting, but I couldn’t tell if he was explaining nuance or using jargon to perform mental gymnastics. I assume the latter, but I’ll be interested to hear what other experts have to say.

    Does anyone have any good resources where people analyze his testimony? It was over my head.

  5. Selling one’s soul for that much definitely puts one in the “good businessman” class.

  6. Trump is guilty as shit on all his charges. We know this. That said, paying expert witnesses is expected or required because you are asking someone to come and devote time and energy to provide a service in their field of expertise. Depending on the field this isn’t necessarily a crazy rate either.

  7. The price of lying has skyrocketed. Nixon paid that much to silence all the Watergate bunglers.

  8. Pay a guy $100 to lie on the stand and you go to jail. Pay a guy $900k to lie on the stand and that’s just a totally legal expert witness

  9. Well that should put some doubt on the credibility of the testimony. I suspect the Judge will consider it appropriately.

  10. I would have liked an article that explained exactly how the professor reached his conclusion. Rather than just repeating his fee again and again.

  11. This guy is going to get taken apart in cross examination:

    > In his deposition, Mr Bartov said he was initially tapped as an expert witness to talk about “generally accepted accounting principles,” the guidelines for crafting statements of financial condition that are at the centre of the case. He said he was “not really familiar” with those guidelines.

    > During his testimony on Thursday, Mr Bartov said he “couldn’t find a single GAAP provision that was violated” in Mr Trump’s documents. “I couldn’t find one.”

    It’s the equivalent of “No officer, I didn’t see any red lights. I was driving with my eyes closed.”

  12. Expert witnesses typically do get paid, but they don’t typically get paid almost a million dollars to do it

  13. The only chance of winning would be from the judge who has already pronounced him guilty. One paid expert will not change the outcome.

  14. Pay me that kind of money, and I’ll admit that I am “not really familiar” on GAAP principles while also (honestly) stating that I can find no fraud.

    After all, it’s probably difficult, without expertise in that area, to definitively say that one can find fraud.

  15. Funny thing is the Trump organization has already been found guilty of fraud in this case. Little too late.

  16. damn, i could have gone in there and spouted some equally believable bullshit for about half that

  17. As my statistic teach once told the class, he does take bribes, but it has to be enough to never work again.

  18. I don’t think anyone has mentioned the 650 hours part. I am a university professor, not in accounting but something actually useful. I would love to have $900k, but there’s no fucking way I could come up with 650 hours to earn it. Not in a year. Not even in two years. It would be literally impossible for me to find that much time for any amount of money other than “quit my job” type of money. No. Fucking. Way.

  19. For nearly a million dollars, Trump could kill someone in cold blood and I would testify that he is innocent and acted in self-defense.

    Not really, but the point is for that much money to a university professor, I think he is obligated to say that labelling a 10k Sq ft building as a 30k Sq ft building is a minor error and that Trump is innocent. You wouldn’t pay nearly a million dollars for someone to be truthful.

    Hope this professor’s career is tanked since he has established that he is no ethics

  20. It’s not a jury trial so judge Engoron can let bullshit like this fly without worrying about the jury being confused.

    His ruling should be a great read.

    Expect trump to appeal at least a couple times. He will lose them.

    If we still have real courts.

  21. So I guess New York University accounting graduates are really not good. Would you invest in a company that financial statements are done by one of their graduates?
    I understand is being paid but however he is also damaging the university reputation

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