The two prosecutors leading the Manhattan district attorney’s criminal case against former President Donald Trump’s real-estate company and its longtime chief financial officer resigned unexpectedly, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Carey Dunne and Mark Pomerantz, who have been at the helm of the probe, quit on Wednesday, the person said, less than two months after Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg took office. Bragg inherited the investigation from his predecessor, Cyrus Vance, who brought the politically charged case just before he left office after 10 years on the job.
The resignations are a major twist in the probe, which last year led to criminal tax charges being filed against the Trump Organization and Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg. The company and Weisselberg, who stepped down from his position after being charged, have both pleaded not guilty and
The New York Times was first to report the prosecutors’ resignations. The district attorney’s office didn’t return a call for comment, nor did Dunne or Pomerantz.
Bruce Green, a law professor and chair of the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics at Fordham Law School, said the resignations are a sign that Bragg has decided not to move ahead with any charges against the Trumps — the biggest question hanging over the case — and that the prosecutors disagree.
“If they were going to do a prosecution of these folks, they would be sticking around to help,” Green said. “The fact that they quit in a public way suggests they wanted the case to go forward and the DA decided not to seek an indictment against Trump or his family.”
The district attorney hasn’t moved to dismiss the charges and no decision has been made publicly regarding further indictments.
Unreported perks
Vance had accused Weisselberg and the Trump Organization of avoiding income taxes by paying employees with unreported perks, including luxury apartments, cars and private-school tuition. In his motion to dismiss the case, the former CFO claimed charges were filed against him because he refused to cooperate with prosecutors and “flip” on Trump.
The criminal case is being conducted in cooperation with New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office said on Wednesday that the probe is ongoing and “robust.”
The Trump Organization has long argued the investigations are politically motivated. In May, Trump issued a statement accusing James and Vance of being “possessed, at an unprecedented level, with destroying the political fortunes of President Donald J. Trump.”
Dunne became Vance’s general counsel shortly after Trump’s 2016 election, following a stint as a senior partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell, one of New York’s most prestigious — and profitable — law firms. Pomerantz, a former federal prosecutor turned corporate litigator at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, had been brought on last year as special assistant district attorney on the case.
Weisselberg, whose motion to dismiss was filed last month and unsealed Tuesday, argued the case against him must be thrown out because the charges are blocked by an immunity deal he reached in a related federal case against Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen.
