Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, leaves the federal courthouse Monday in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, leaves the federal courthouse Monday in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Judge not ready to remove ex-Trump aides from house arrest

She wants more commitment to forfeit millions in assets if they fail to show up for court dates.

  • By ERIC TUCKER Associated Press
  • Monday, November 6, 2017 12:56pm
  • Nation-World

By Eric Tucker / Associated Press

WASHINGTON — A federal judge said Monday that she was inclined to remove from house arrest two former aides to President Donald Trump’s campaign now facing criminal charges but would not do so until receiving more detailed financial information from them.

Lawyers for Paul Manafort, who led Trump’s campaign for several months last year, and his business associate Rick Gates said in court that they were still working with prosecutors on a financial package that would guarantee their appearance at future court dates while allowing them to be released from home confinement.

But the lawyers said they had not made final arrangements yet, and U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson declined to take them off home detention until additional details about their personal wealth are disclosed, along with a more specific commitment to forfeit millions of dollars in assets if they fail to show up for future court dates.

That means the men remain at least for now on home confinement, a condition imposed last week following their indictment.

Jackson did indicate that she was leaning in favor of easing that condition once more information is submitted, but she also said she was likely to impose certain restrictions, such as a bar on international travel or on being in the vicinity of airports and other transportation facilities.

Manafort and Gates surrendered last week to the FBI to face criminal charges brought by special counsel Robert Mueller and his team of prosecutors, who are investigating potential coordination between Trump campaign aides and Russia.

The men are accused of laundering the profits of foreign consulting work performed on behalf of a Ukrainian political party and concealing those assets from the U.S. government. They have pleaded not guilty and were placed on home confinement with GPS monitoring.

The men entered the courtroom separately with their lawyers and did not speak during Monday’s bond hearing, though Gates at one point quietly conferred with his lawyer after a judge asked about his consulting practice.

At their first court appearance last week, a federal magistrate released Manafort on $10 million bond and Gates on $5 million bond. Those amounts reflect money the men would have to forfeit if they failed to return to court as required.

In court papers, Manafort pledged $12.5 million in real estate assets in New York and Florida and life insurance policies. He promised to limit his travel to Washington, D.C., Florida, New York and Virginia and to not apply for any travel documents.

Prosecutors have described Manafort and Gates as potential flight risks given the seriousness of the charges against them, their personal wealth and the possibility of yearslong prison sentences. They said in court documents over the weekend that they had yet to substantiate Manafort’s net worth, which he has placed at $28 million, and questioned whether a Fifth Avenue property that Manafort has valued at $3 million — and had pledged to secure his bond — is actually worth that much.

Though prosecutors have said Manafort had three passports with different numbers, his lawyers objected to efforts to portray him as a “‘Jason Bourne’ character.” They said that of the three passports, he used one to submit with visa applications to certain foreign countries, and the third he applied for and obtained after he had lost his primary one.

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Nation-World

FILE - Britain's Queen Elizabeth II looks on during a visit to officially open the new building at Thames Hospice, Maidenhead, England July 15, 2022. Buckingham Palace says Queen Elizabeth II is under medical supervision as doctors are “concerned for Her Majesty’s health.” The announcement comes a day after the 96-year-old monarch canceled a meeting of her Privy Council and was told to rest. (Kirsty O'Connor/Pool Photo via AP, File)
Queen Elizabeth II dead at 96 after 70 years on the throne

Britain’s longest-reigning monarch and a rock of stability across much of a turbulent century died Thursday.

A woman reacts as she prepares to leave an area for relatives of the passengers aboard China Eastern's flight MU5735 at the Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, Tuesday, March 22, 2022, in Guangzhou. No survivors have been found as rescuers on Tuesday searched the scattered wreckage of a China Eastern plane carrying 132 people that crashed a day earlier on a wooded mountainside in China's worst air disaster in more than a decade. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)
No survivors found in crash of Boeing 737 in China

What caused the plane to drop out of the sky shortly before it was to being its descent remained a mystery.

In this photo taken by mobile phone released by Xinhua News Agency, a piece of wreckage of the China Eastern's flight MU5735 are seen after it crashed on the mountain in Tengxian County, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on Monday, March 21, 2022. A China Eastern Boeing 737-800 with 132 people on board crashed in a remote mountainous area of southern China on Monday, officials said, setting off a forest fire visible from space in the country's worst air disaster in nearly a decade. (Xinhua via AP)
Boeing 737 crashes in southern China with 132 aboard

More than 15 hours after communication was lost with the plane, there was still no word of survivors.

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., center, arrives at the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C. with Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, right, the vice president-elect, on Wednesday morning. Gaetz withdrew from consideration Thursday, saying he was an unfair distraction to the transition. (Haiyun Jiang / The New York Times)
Matt Gaetz withdraws from consideration as attorney general

“It is clear that my confirmation was unfairly becoming a distraction,” Gaetz wrote Thursday on X.

Attendees react after Fox News called the presidential race for Former President Donald Trump, during an election night event at the Palm Beach County Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Wednesday. Trump made gains in every corner of the country and with nearly every demographic group. (Haiyun Jiang / The New York Times)
Donald Trump returns to power, ushering in new era of uncertainty

Despite criminal convictions and fears of authoritarianism, Trump rode frustrations over the economy and immigration.

Voters cast their ballots at a polling place inside the Weisman Art Museum at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5 2024. Voters headed into polling stations on Tuesday in the closing hours of a presidential contest that both major parties said would take the country in dramatically different directions, capping a contentious and exhausting 107-day sprint that began when President Joe Biden abandoned his bid for a second term.  (Caroline Yang/The New York Times)
Live updates: Georgia called for Trump

The Daily Herald will be providing live updates on national election developments throughout Tuesday.

Liam Payne performs during the Jingle Ball at Madison Square Garden in New York in 2017. Payne, who rose to fame as a singer and songwriter for the British group One Direction, one of the best-selling boy bands of all time, died after falling from the third floor of a hotel in Buenos Aires on Wednesday. He was 31. (Chad Batka / The New York Times)
Liam Payne, 31, former One Direction singer, dies in fall in Argentina

Payne rose to fame as a member of one of the bestselling boy bands of all time before embarking upon a solo career.

In this photo taken from video provided by the Ukrainian Presidential Press Office, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks to the nation in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. Street fighting broke out in Ukraine's second-largest city Sunday and Russian troops put increasing pressure on strategic ports in the country's south following a wave of attacks on airfields and fuel facilities elsewhere that appeared to mark a new phase of Russia's invasion. (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP)
Ukraine wants EU membership, but accession often takes years

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s request has enthusiastic support from several member states.

FILE - Ukrainian servicemen walk by fragments of a downed aircraft,  in in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Feb. 25, 2022. The International Criminal Court's prosecutor has put combatants and their commanders on notice that he is monitoring Russia's invasion of Ukraine and has jurisdiction to prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity. But, at the same time, Prosecutor Karim Khan acknowledges that he cannot investigate the crime of aggression. (AP Photo/Oleksandr Ratushniak, File)
ICC prosecutor to open probe into war crimes in Ukraine

U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet confirmed that 102 civilians have been killed.

FILE - Refugees fleeing conflict from neighboring Ukraine arrive to Zahony, Hungary, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2022. As hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians seek refuge in neighboring countries, cradling children in one arm and clutching belongings in the other, leaders in Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, Moldova and Romania are offering a hearty welcome. (AP Photo/Anna Szilagyi, File)
Europe welcomes Ukrainian refugees — others, less so

It is a stark difference from treatment given to migrants and refugees from the Middle East and Africa.

Afghan evacuees disembark the plane and board a bus after landing at Skopje International Airport, North Macedonia, on Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2021. North Macedonia has hosted another group of 44 Afghan evacuees on Wednesday where they will be sheltered temporarily till their transfer to final destinations. (AP Photo/Boris Grdanoski)
‘They are safe here.’ Snohomish County welcomes hundreds of Afghans

The county’s welcoming center has been a hub of services and assistance for migrants fleeing Afghanistan since October.

FILE - In this April 15, 2019, file photo, a vendor makes change for a marijuana customer at a cannabis marketplace in Los Angeles. An unwelcome trend is emerging in California, as the nation's most populous state enters its fifth year of broad legal marijuana sales. Industry experts say a growing number of license holders are secretly operating in the illegal market — working both sides of the economy to make ends meet. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)
In California pot market, a hazy line between legal and not

Industry insiders say the practice of working simultaneously in the legal and illicit markets is a financial reality.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.