Mar 14, 2017 · Inside the Manhattan building, Bharara spoke to dozens of employees who had worked for him since his summer 2009 appointment to an office that has proved to be a hotbed of future leaders in ...
Mar 11, 2017 · “Preet Bharara is no longer US attorney of the Southern District of New York,” a Justice Department spokesperson told CNN Saturday. Bharara announced that Joon H. Kim, the current deputy US ...
Mar 12, 2017 · The Southern District of New York, which Mr. Bharara has overseen since 2009, encompasses Manhattan, Mr. Trump’s home before he was elected president, as well as the Bronx, Westchester County ...
May 18, 2015 · Statement Of Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara On The Penalties Imposed By The Court On Countrywide, Bank Of America, And Rebecca Mairone For Engaging In Mortgage Fraud Totaling In Excess Of One Billion Dollars. “Today, Judge Rakoff imposed stiff penalties in a case brought by this Office to punish and deter the fraudulent and reckless lending activities of …
Dec 11, 2015 · Statement Of Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara On The Convictions Of Former New York State Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos And His Son Adam Skelos “The swift convictions of Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos beg an important question – how many prosecutions will it take before Albany gives the people of New York the honest government ...
In November, he met at Trump Tower with the president-elect and several of his advisers, including Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner , and his chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, according to two people briefed on that discussion who requested anonymity.
Bharara notified an adviser to the attorney general, Jeff Sessions, that the president had tried to contact him and that he would not respond because of those protocols. Mr.
Bharara then called Mr. Trump’s assistant back to say he could not speak with the president, citing the protocols. Mr. Bharara was a highly public prosecutor who relished the spotlight throughout more than seven years in office.
It was Dana Boente, the acting deputy attorney general, who called Mr. Bharara on Saturday. According to a Justice Department official, Mr. Boente told Mr. Bharara that he was one of the 46 United States attorneys being told to resign.
Bharara’s departure that way, saying only, “I can confirm that Mr. Bharara is no longer the U.S.
At the meeting, according to those briefed, Mr. Trump asked Mr. Bharara to remain in the job, which Mr. Bharara relayed to reporters and television cameras in the Trump Tower lobby. Then came the order to resign on Friday, creating what was described as a feeling of whiplash in the prosecutor’s Manhattan office.
He prosecuted nearly 100 Wall Street executives for insider trading and securities fraud using these methods. Bharara closed multi-million dollar settlements with the four largest banks in the country, and most notably, shut down multiple high-profile hedge funds. Known for his technocratic approach to prosecution, he routinely convicted both Democratic and Republican politicians on public corruption violations. Bharara occasionally pursued criminals extraterritorially, which after a 2013 Russian money laundering investigation, had him permanently banned from entering Russia. He also strained India–United States diplomatic relations by prosecuting prominent members of the Indian and Indian-American community, most notably high-profile diplomats, chief executives, businessmen, and hedge fund managers.
Upon the election of U.S. President Donald Trump, Bharara was dismissed after refusing to submit his resignation as part of the 2017 dismissal of U.S. attorneys. After leaving government, he went into academia by joining New York University School of Law 's criminal justice faculty.
In 2013, the jury found Bank of America liable for selling Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac thousands of defective loans in the first mortgage-fraud case brought by the U.S. government to go to trial. The civil verdict also found the bank’s Countrywide Financial unit and former Countrywide executive Rebecca Mairone liable. However, in 2016 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled that the finding of fact by the jury that low-quality mortgages were supplied by Countrywide to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac supported only "intentional breach of contract," not fraud. The action, for civil fraud, relied on provisions of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act. The decision turned on lack of intent to defraud at the time the contract to supply mortgages was made.
In April 2013, Bharara gave the authorization to the FBI for the raid on Alimzhan Tokhtakhunov 's apartment in Trump Tower. In April 2013, the case was personal for Bharara after Russia included him on the list 18 U.S. individuals banned from entering Russia in retaliation to the Magnitsky act.
In April 2012, Kruger was sentenced to seven years in prison. In February 2011, Bharara announced the indictment of five consultants working on New York City’s electronic payroll and timekeeping project, CityTime, for misappropriating more than $80 million from the project.
In 2012, the bank reached a settlement with Bharara's office to pay $158 million for misleading the government into insuring risky loans. Bharara also made a criminal inquiry into Citibank's Mexican unit. In 2014, Citi settled with federal prosecutors for $7 billion for ignoring warnings on risky loans.
In 2011 when hedge fund portfolio manager Chip Skowron pleaded guilty to in sider trading, Bharara said: "Chip Skowron is the latest example of a portfolio manager willing to pay for proprietary, non-public information that gave him an illegal trading edge over the average investor. The integrity of our market is damaged by people who engage in insider trading...." Skowron was sent to prison for five years. Bharara has often spoken publicly and written an op-ed about the culture surrounding corporate crime and its effect on market confidence and business risk.