Ms. James brought the case against the Trumps for fraudulently misstating valuations of their properties in violation of New York’s Executive Law. That law (as I’ve written in these pages) defines fraud in terms of untruths without requiring proof of deceptive intent, negligence or harm. The statute doesn’t even require proof that the untrue information is material. The statute thus lets government target mere untruths.Trump just won the appeal, but the five judges could not agree on the reasoning, and there will have to more appeals.
Trump does tend to exaggerate, but that should be his constitutional right. Usually businessmen are allowed to do that, as long as they are not deliberately lying to cheat someone out of money.
This continues the Trump pattern of losing in the lower courts, and winning on appeal.
It would be nice if some appeals court struck down that NY law. I hate to think that NY might prosecute me for making a factual mistake on this blog.
No comments:
Post a Comment