Manafort trial - live updates: IRS agent testifies Manafort did not pay taxes on $15.5 million in Ukrainian income as Judge TS Ellis clashes with prosecutors

Interrogation of government's star witness continues after he is accused of telling 'so many lies' he cannot remember them all

Ex-Trump Campaign Chair Manafort's Court Arrival

The bruising cross-examination of Paul Manafort’s protege continues today, with Rick Gates set to return to the witness stand for a third day.

Mr Gates – the government’s star witness in a case against Donald Trump’s erstwhile campaign chairman – was yesterday accused of being immersed in “so many lies” he cannot remember them all.

Lawyers for Mr Manafort are challenging the credibility of Mr Gates. Defence lawyer Kevin Downing has already pressed Mr Gates on lies he told special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators and on the hundreds of thousands of dollars he admitted to embezzling from his former boss.

Mr Downing briefly ventured into territory the two sides mostly avoided for the first five days of the trial: the president’s presidential campaign. The charges are not related to Mr Manafort’s work with the Trump campaign.

Today, the lawyer is set to grill Mr Gates further about a “secret life” he claims was funded by embezzlement and about an extramarital affair that Mr Gates has admitted.

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Key Points

What we know so far:

[8 August 2018 16:43 · Steve Anderson]

Court proceedings have been placed on a short break, before an FBI accountant is expected to take the stand.

Morgan Magionos, an FBI forensic accountant called to testify by prosecutors, tracked Mr Manafort’s wire transfers for the federal agency. The judge is considering whether he will be permitted to read emails the president’s former campaign chairman sent, along with his phone records. 

[8 August 2018 17:15 · Kristin Hugo]

Earlier, following  a question to Rick Gates on whether he had disclosed four apparent extramarital affairs to Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team, Judge TS Ellis then had a private conversation with both sets of lawyers about whether the defence could ask about other extramarital affairs. Mr Gates already disclosed one yesterday.

Once the judge talked to the lawyers, however, the defence wasn't able to re-ask Gates the question about four extramarital affairs. 

Instead, Mr Gates was aske more broadly: "Does your secret life span over many years?"

Mr Gates responded yes. "I made many mistakes over many years," he said.

His three days on the witness stand then ended. 

[8 August 2018 18:12 · Kristin Hugo]

 

Judge TS Ellis has once again reminded prosecutors, saying they should wrap their case quickly. 

"As a concession to the shortness of life, we need to get it done," Mr Ellis said, after prosecutor Greg Andres implored him to allow them to show the jury documents an FBI agent reviewed. "Now we need to bring it to a close and it's lunchtime."

Mr Andres said his side has focused sharply on the accusations they need to prove.

[8 August 2018 18:31 · Mythili Sampathkumar]

Just ahead of the lunch break, Morgan Magionos took the stand. She is the FBI forensic accountant and certified fraud examiner who was in charge of reviewing Mr Manafort's financial accounts as part of the investigation. 

Ms Magionos reviewed bank statements from institutions in Cyprus, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and the UK to examine the former campaign manager's overseas financial activity and related domestic spending. 

She connected Mr Manafort to 31 accounts - along with Mr Gates and Russian-Ukrainian political consultant Konstantin Kilimnik. She testified she was able to do so because copies of Mr Manafort's passport was included in the documents required to open each of the accounts. 

[8 August 2018 19:32 · Mythili Sampathkumar]

Ms Magionos came back on the witness stand after lunch and stated Mr Manafort had closed all his bank accounts for which he was listed as "beneficial owner" in Cyprus by July 2014. 

In lieu of those accounts, Mr Manafort opened the accounts she found in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Mr Kilimnik was the owner and employees of Cypriot lawyer Kypros Chrysostomides were listed as having signature authority. 

Mr Gates had earlier indicated the money move was due to the Mediterranean island's banking crisis at the time. 

The FBI accountant also testified she came up with a list of Cypriot companies for which Mr Manafort, Mr Gates, and Mr Kilimnik are listed on the incorporation documents.

Many of the names listed as employees of those companies came from another company, Inter Jura Cy, which had ties to Mr Chrysostomides' law firm. 

[8 August 2018 19:33 · Mythili Sampathkumar]

Cyprus is seen as an offshore tax haven for the very wealthy, but in this instance the FBI was able to obtain the bank and company records through a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty agreed to with small nation.

[8 August 2018 19:51 · Mythili Sampathkumar]

Ms Magionos, the GBI forensic accountant investing Mr Manafort's financial records, reviewed documents while on the stand which connected his overseas accounts to the purchases he made in the US which were revealed earlier through testimony by employees of retailers like the ultra-exclusive New York boutique Alan Couture and the "world's most expensive store," Beverly Hills' House of Bijan. 

She said Mr Manafort also used similar foreign wire transfers to pay for vehicles from Land Rover in Alexandria, Virginia, and other retailers. 

[8 August 2018 19:56 · Mythili Sampathkumar]

Ms Magionos also testified regarding several email chains between Mr Manafort and his lawyers in which he discussed wire transfers from his foreign accounts to those vendors, for purchasing real estate, and business expenses for his company DMP International. 

She read one email in particular regarding clothing purchases from Alan Couture, where Mr Manafort spent nearly $800,000 in 2010 alone. It read: "Pls make the 5 transfers listed below from the Leviathan account and confirm to me when completed". 

Following that email, $32,000 was transferred to the boutique.

Ms Magionos also testified Mr Manafort used money from the foreign accounts to partially cover invoices for $1.6m to Big Picture Solutions, a home technology company. 

[8 August 2018 20:08 · Kristin Hugo]

The FBI agent showed payments to Alan Couture totaling $1,032,589.59. About a quarter of the total payment came from Mr Manafort's registered accounts in the US. Nearly $750,000 got wired in from overseas accounts to the men's boutique.

Some amounts that Alan Couture billed Mr Manafort exactly matched transfers from the shell companies, FBI forensic specialist Morgan Magionis testified.

Last week, vendors including a former manager of Alan Couture testified that they knew the money from the foreign entities paid for Mr Manafort's orders, even though the vendors didn't recognize the company names.

[8 August 2018 20:54 · Kristin Hugo]

FBI forensic accountant Morgan Magionis has presented several charts, documents and financial totals she put together regarding Paul Manafort's foreign accounts and lobbying work.

Mr Manafort collected a total of $65 million over four years in his foreign bank accounts for his Ukrainian political work, according to Ms Magionis' testimony. And from 2010 to 2014 he paid $15.6 million for real estate, landscaping, home improvement and personal luxuries.