Paul Manafort Found Guilty

Paul Manafort has been found guilty of eight counts of filing false tax returns, failing to file FBARs, and bank fraud.

The verdict is in. The jury has found Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign manager, guilty of 8 of the 18 counts charged against him.

Five counts of filing false tax returns

Manafort filed false returns for five tax years, in violation of
26 U.S. Code § 7206.

The jury found that Manafort did not report or pay taxes from 2010 through 2014 on more than $30 million he earned from his work in the Ukraine, instead hiding the money in offshore accounts in Cyprus and the Grenadines. He was found guilty of five separate charges – one for each year he falsely filed.

One count of failure to report his foreign holdings

The jury was undecided about Manafort’s FBAR requirement for all but one year. He was found guilty of violating 31 U.S.C. § 5314 for 2012 alone.

Despite his claims to the contrary, Manafort controlled more than a dozen foreign accounts valued in the tens of millions of dollars. Although an FBAR must be filed whenever a taxpayer holds $10,000 or more overseas, Manafort didn’t file any – although he was only convicted for his 2012 omission.

Two counts of bank fraud

The jury was undecided about most of the bank fraud charges, but found Manafort guilty under 18 U.S.C. § 1344 for lying to banks to secure two of the loans.

The two counts of bank fraud for which Manafort was convicted related to two loans he received between 2015 and 2017 that totalled $4.4 million: The first, for lying to a bank that one of his rental properties was a second home (and failing to disclose that he had a mortgage on it). The second, for overstating the annual income of his consulting firm by $4 million.

The other counts

The jury did not issue a verdict regarding Manafort’s missing 2011, 2013, and 2014 FBARs, nor did it decide on most of the bank fraud and bank fraud conspiracy charges. Manafort could be retried on these counts in the future.

In the meantime, we should expect him to spend approximately a decade behind bars as a result of the current guilty verdicts.

The next trial

Manafort’s next trial is scheduled to begin on September 17th in Washington, D.C.. Round Two will focus on his Ukrainian dealings – namely, unregistered foreign lobbying, false statements made to the U.S. government, and obstruction of justice for witness tampering.