A prosecutor who investigated Donald Trump says the former president was “guilty of numerous felony violations.”
Mark Pomerantz made the stunning assertion in his resignation letter last month to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who paused the pursuit of an indictment in the criminal investigation into Trump and his business practices.
“As you know from our recent conversations and presentations, I believe that Donald Trump is guilty of numerous felony violations of the Penal Law in connection with the preparation and use of his annual Statements of Financial Condition,” Pomerantz said in the letter, which was reported by the New York Times on Wednesday.
“His financial statements were false, and he has a long history of fabricating information relating to his personal finances and lying about his assets to banks, the national media, counterparties, and many others, including the American people. The team that has been investigating Mr. Trump harbors no doubt about whether he committed crimes — he did,” Pomerantz said.
Pomerantz resigned from the investigation along with fellow prosecutor Carey Dunne after what was reported to be a monthlong pause in the presentation of evidence to a grand jury. He said in his Feb. 23 resignation letter that then-District Attorney Cyrus Vance directed a thorough review of the facts and law relating to Trump’s financial statements in late 2021.
PROSECUTORS LEADING MANHATTAN DA’S TRUMP INVESTIGATION RESIGN
“Mr. Vance had been intimately involved in our investigation, attending grand jury presentations, sitting in on certain witness interviews, and receiving regular reports about the progress of the investigation. He concluded that the facts warranted prosecution, and he directed the team to present evidence to a grand jury and to seek an indictment of Mr. Trump and other defendants as soon as reasonably possible,” Pomerantz wrote.
When Bragg took over at the start of 2022, Pomerantz said the new district attorney “devoted significant time and energy to understanding the evidence we have accumulated with respect to the Trump financial statements, as well as the applicable law,” after which Bragg “reached the decision not to go forward with the grand jury presentation and not to seek criminal charges at the present time.”
While Pomerantz said the investigation “has been suspended indefinitely,” a spokeswoman for Bragg, Danielle Filson, insisted the inquiry was continuing, the New York Times reported. “A team of experienced prosecutors is working every day to follow the facts and the law. There is nothing more we can or should say at this juncture about an ongoing investigation,” Filson added.
Trump, whose Trump Organization business empire is also facing a civil inquiry run by New York Attorney General Letitia James, has denied any wrongdoing. His lawyer, Ronald Fischetti, told the newspaper that Pomerantz “had the opportunity to present the fruits of his investigation to the D.A. and his senior staff on several occasions and failed.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Bragg’s decision “not to prosecute Donald Trump now, and on the existing record, is misguided and completely contrary to the public interest,” Pomerantz said, citing it as his reason to resign.
“To the extent you have raised issues as to the legal and factual sufficiency of our case and the likelihood that a prosecution would succeed, I and others have advised you that we have evidence sufficient to establish Mr. Trump’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and we believe that the prosecution would prevail if charges were brought and the matter were tried to an impartial jury,” he wrote. “No case is perfect. Whatever the risks of bringing the case may be, I am convinced that a failure to prosecute will pose much greater risks in terms of public confidence in the fair administration of justice.”
