How Trump’s historic fraud trial unfolded: Gag orders, courtroom outbursts and a $350m outcome
After a three-year-long investigation, more than 40 witnesses, 11 weeks of trial testimony, and thousands of pages of evidence, Donald Trump and his co-defendants in a sprawling civil fraud case have been ordered to pay more than $364m following a decade-long fraud scheme.
New York Justice Arthur Engoron handed down his final ruling in the case on 16 February, hitting the former president, his adult sons Eric and Donald Jr and several former Trump Organization executives with millions of dollars in financial penalties.
Mr Trump is also barred from from holding any executive office with a New York company and from getting loans from New York banks for the next three years.
His sons are barred from executive offices with any New York company for two years while former executives Allen Weisselberg and Jeffrey McConney were hit with lifetime bans from financially controlling any New York businesses, as well as three-year bans from serving as an officer or director of any New York business.
In the ruling, the judge admonished Mr Trump and his co-defendants for the fraud – as well as their continued refusal to admit their errors.
“Their complete lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological,” he said.
The civil trial in New York County Supreme Court in lower Manhattan was among the first facing the former president as he campaigns to return to the White House – and one that directly threatened his real estate empire and the family brand that he has long used to build a narrative of self-made success.
The ruling on 16 February comes roughly 17 months after New York Attorney General sued Mr Trump, his adult sons and their chief executives at the Trump Organization, alleging a decade-long pattern of fraud to convince banks and lenders
