Trump's longtime CFO faces sentencing for tax fraud scheme

NEW YORK (AP) — Allen Weisselberg, a longtime executive for Donald Trump's real estate empire whose testimony helped convict the former president’s company of tax fraud, is set to be sentenced Tuesday for dodging taxes on $1.7 million in job perks.

New York Judge Juan Manuel Merchan is expected to sentence Weisselberg, a senior Trump Organization adviser and former chief financial officer, to five months in jail, in keeping with a plea agreement reached in August.

Weisselberg, 75, was promised that sentence when he agreed to plead guilty to 15 tax crimes and testify against the company, where he’s worked since the mid-1980s.

When he begins serving his sentence, Weisselberg is expected to be locked up at New York City’s notorious Rikers Island jail complex. He will be eligible for release after little more than three months if he behaves behind bars.

As part of his plea agreement, Weisselberg must also pay nearly $2 million in taxes, penalties and interest, which he said he has made significant progress paying. He must also complete five years of probation.

Weisselberg faced the prospect of up to 15 years in prison — the maximum punishment for the top grand larceny charge — if he were to have reneged on the deal or if he didn’t testify truthfully at the Trump Organization’s trial. He is the only person charged in the Manhattan district attorney’s three-year investigation of Trump and his business practices.

Weisselberg testified for three days, offering a glimpse into the inner workings of Trump’s real estate empire. Weisselberg has worked for Trump’s family for nearly 50 years, starting as an accountant for his developer father, Fred Trump, in 1973 before joining Donald Trump in 1986 and helping expand the family company's focus beyond New York City into a global...