ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Paul Manafort’s former business associate Richard Gates testified on Tuesday that his former boss directed him to wire money directly from Cyprus-based accounts to pay U.S. vendors and that he created fake invoices for those transactions.
Gates, the prosecution’s star witness who took the stand for the second consecutive day in the criminal trial against President Trump’s former campaign chairman, admitted to drafting invoices from luxury clothing stores and landscapers to make it look like Global Endeavor, a company in Cyprus that Manafort owned, was footing the bill instead of Manafort.
Gates, the prosecution’s star witness who took the stand for the second consecutive day in the criminal trial against President Trump’s former campaign chairman, admitted to drafting invoices from luxury clothing stores and landscapers to make it look like Global Endeavor, a company in Cyprus that Manafort owned, was footing the bill instead of Manafort.
“Fair to say it was a fake invoice?” prosecutor Greg Andres asked as Gates reviewed an invoice for $42,000 that gave the appearance of being sent from Alan Couture, a high-end New York City clothing store, to Global Endeavor.
“Yes,” replied Gates, a former Trump campaign adviser.
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Gates said on Tuesday that when payments were made to vendors the money would come from both Cyprus and U.S. accounts. But when Andres asked if Gates would report those payments to Manafort’s bookkeeper, Heather Washkuhn, Gates said the U.S. payments were reported, but not the ones from the Cyprus accounts.
“How did this benefit Mr. Manafort?” Andres asked.
By not reporting the wire transfers, Gates explained, the payments were never disclosed on Manafort’s U.S. business records, essentially lowering the amount of income that should have been reported on his federal tax returns.
Manafort stared straight at Gates as his former associate said he was directed by Manafort to disguise millions of dollars in income as loans from a shell company in Cyprus owned by Manafort.
Gates said the money was documented as loans from Cypriot companies, “but in reality it was money moving between the accounts.”
Judge T.S. Ellis interrupted at one point to ask if the money recorded as a loan was compensation for work being done in Ukraine.
Gates said it was.
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Manafort associate testifies that they used shell companies to disguise millions of dollars in income as loans https://t.co/S3a1NCXznn pic.twitter.com/EeZtQBON3M
— The Hill (@thehill) August 7, 2018
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