The Weisselberg-Necheles Scheme to Avoid Taxes: A State Court’s Perspective on Mr. Trump’s Case

The trial, which is expected to last more than a month, will see the defense argue that Mr. Weisselberg did not act in concert with the company to avoid paying taxes.

“Weisselberg’s acts were done to benefit himself and not done to benefit the company and we expect to show that at trial and be acquitted,” said one of the company’s lawyers, Susan R. Necheles. The company lost money as a result of the scheme, while the prosecutors could argue that the company saved money by not paying payroll taxes.

The lawyers could point out that Mr. Weisselberg faced years in prison if he had refused to testify. The plea deal calls for him to serve five months in jail, but with good behavior, he is likely to spend only 100 days there.

If his client lied on the witness stand, the judge overseeing the case could impose up to a 15-year prison sentence, according to his lawyer.

The case against Mr. Trump has been seen as a “witch hunt” against him, similar to the way he uses legal problems to get his supporters to back him.

“This, certainly on its face, appears to be objectively frivolous,” said Gerald Greenberg, a partner at Gelber, Schachter and Greenberg, a Florida law firm. “I’m aware of no authority that allows a state court in Florida to enjoin or otherwise interfere with a law enforcement investigation being conducted by New York state authorities.”

Another lawyer for Mr. Trump, Christopher M. Kise, a former Florida solicitor general, also objected to the filing of the lawsuit on Wednesday. According to people with knowledge of the matter, the Florida lawsuit would undermine Mr. Trump’s defense in Ms. James’ case and cost them credibility with the New York attorney general’s office and the judge overseeing the case.

One person close to Mr. Trump who was briefed on the Florida suit insisted it was meritorious, because Ms. James had focused on Mr. Trump’s revocable trust, a legal entity that owns the Trump Organization, and Florida’s laws governing trusts and wills are relevant.

The spokeswoman for Ms. James said that the judges have dismissed Trump’s attempts to evade justice and no number of lawsuits would deter us from pursuing this fraud.

I know that Trump wasn’t on trial. But actually, what’s funny, I don’t think most people in this world know that Trump’s not on trial,” the juror said. “But like everyone realizes that on the jury because it was ingrained in our head 20 times.”

The Trump Org.’s internal “clean up” of questionable business practices around the time Trump was elected president particularly struck the juror as a red flag.

A juror said they needed to understand the law for people who were uncertain on some counts, but that they had agut feeling about their vote. The jury asked to have the charge reread for five of the counts when they reached a verdict.

“He just he puts like sketchy people around him,” the juror added, reflecting on other Trump comrades like Michael Cohen and Steve Bannon. I find it very strange.

“I was kind of like ‘this seems weird’ and then it confirmed that when they said in the cleanup of 2017, they stopped doing it,” the juror said. I felt like it was a red flag that the company was doing something that shouldn’t have been done and that it was culture of fraud in the company. So how could someone working in a company that has fraud going on from different angles be operating solely for themselves.”

There was no question that the crime was committed here. And there, they were all over the place on the defense with passing blame.”

“He was like, imitating like in a derogatory way Donald Bender during the closing statements. The juror thought that was disrespectful and not necessary.

“This trial went on for six weeks. There were many things we went through. There was a lot of illegal things going on there, not only the Weisselberg W-2’s.

“If I listened to just the defense and didn’t listen to the prosecution, yeah, I probably would have believed them. But when you go through everything, put everything together, the big picture, looking at the witnesses, like game their credibility, the actual physical evidence I saw, you know, that helps me get to the conclusion.”