which, as a professional involved in this business, cindy laporta did understand. then you have mewer's prosecutor ask, what was your understanding at the time of whether that was appropriate? laporta replies, "it's not appropriate." and she confessed she went along with it and helped manafort falsify those critical documents. "i could have refused to file the tax return. that would have exposed the firm" laporta reported. i could have called them liars. but manafort was a longtime client of the firm. i didn't want to do that either. she added, quote, i very much regret it. and that is immunity witness number one. there are four more people who have immunity who are ready to testify, plus the star witness, rick gates. we turn now to our in-house experts. josh garcia, and joyce vance, a former federal prosecutor as well as an msnbc analyst. they both kept a close eye on the case. josh, you were in the courtroom today. how damaging was cindy laporta's testimony and could you glean at all from the mood of the jury or the faces that she was hurt at all by the fact that

not as fast as i should have been but cindy laporta is still on the stand. there's some redirect by the prosecution. she's the accountant who acknowledged submitting information on manafort's taxes that she wasn't sure was accurate and turned out to be inaccurate and caused what prosecutors say is tax fraud. the same with a bank loan. she testified under grant of immunity and committed being complicit in what prosecutors call bank fraud. downing spent a while on the stand trying to fuzz that up and suggest there could be alternate explanations and perhaps it wasn't criminal, maybe it could have resulted in an irs fine. that really wasn't conclusion e exclusive. i think the most important witness we're about to say. it's all hanging on rick gates. if manafort's defense is rick gates embezzled millions of dollars and orchestrated this fraud, perhaps he has some evidence because we haven't seen any yet. >> we've heard them make that pitch publicly to say it was rick gates who master mindimind of this. that doesn't seem plausible given the facts before us right

they had heather testify, cindy laporta, rick gates actually helped, too.ient. he's a great kid and so happy he didn't have to testify. >> in the case of cindy laporta, she -- >> had an immunity deal and not in legal jeopardy for what she testified to in court if she tells the truth. >> helping paul manafort with his tax returns. she said she regretted it and got use immunity. we learned yesterday she has nevertheless been fired. she nevertheless lost her job. immunity deals usually involve copping to illegal activity. is your client having to worry about that kind of stuff too? the other clients on this list? i can't comment on that. >> i have one other question. judge ellis. >> that's what i thought you were going to start with. that's why i was smiling. >> you've tried cases before him. is he always like this? >> let me just tell you this. i appeared in front of judge ellis for 20 years. i had seven trials and hundreds of hearings. i lost count of the number of hearings. what you're seeing from judge ellis is what i saw the first time i appeared in front

so cindy laporta back on the stand, and she could be subjected to a very harsh cross-examination.he prosecutors and the defense are fighting other whether or not there was a deal behind the scenes to keep her out of jail. what went into that, especially when you're dealing with the special counsel in the russia investigation. another witness very likely to get a tough cross-examination would be rick gates. that is the long tyime deputy t paul manafort. he struck a deal of his own, he pleaded guilty to related charges and is now cooperating with the government. >> how many people it takes to make an alleged crime like this happen. what should everyone be watching for in the mfrt trial. what are you waiting to see? >> i think the interesting piece will be whether or not the defense is able, going forward, to knock down the credibility of the existing government witnesses. the interesting thing about this case is that these witnesses, no one is really clean in this case. even the people who are testifying in favor of the government's case and important the government's case, they hav

cindy laporta says she had been told to concoct a $900,000 loan on his tax return in 2015., tax fraud, and failing to report foreign bank accounts. a report commissioned by the united nations as north korea has not stopped its nuclear and missile programmes. it continues to flout sanctions and has attempted to sell conventional weapons are broad. it reports that pyongyang tried to engage the services of a syrian arms traffic to sell weapons to libya, yemen and saddam. at least 25 people have been killed in a suicide attack on a mosque in eastern afghanistan. two men wearing women's burqas opened fire on shia muslims attending friday prayers in the eastern city of gardez. dozens of people were injured, including children. it's unclear who carried out the attack, although the islamic state group has targeted the shia minority in the past. more than 500 people have died in heavy rains in india so far this year, and there's still a month of the monsoon season to go. the north—eastern state of assam has been particularly badly hit, as nick beake reports. water is painting a dram

then we saw another tax preparer, cindy laporta. and she, there is a reason she had immunity because she said she was disturbed and she eventually drew a line and stopped doing this. but never wanted to report it because she didn't want to open up her firm to litigation. there is a pattern, rick gates and paul manafort worked hand in glove. it was not rick gates. and that also time and time again, paul manafort both personally and his own individual tax returns and his company try to hide and obfuscate what his financial situation was. whether he was trying to act like he had more money to get more loans or erase money off the books. >> and laporta strikes me as important for this reason. part of the argument for the defense is whatever he is being done he didn't know about, maybe was all a mistake. oh, i didn't know you had to check the box. laporta is up there saying i knew what they were doing, they knew what they were doing. >> she was able to take us through the time period. and what we saw through her testimony is these accoun

and then we had a witness, cindy laporta. she knowingly falsified these documents.he felt personally disturbed. >> what do you make of a fact of a guy who lost his empire, no more luxury lifestyle, he is broke and then he goes to work for trump. i know actions is always good. what was the intrigue here? a broken guy going to work for free for trump. >> it is intriguing. and i mean, this trial isn't going to answer the question. but it certainly lays the base for the big question which hopefully mueller will answer for us at some point which is as you say, he was a desperate man, broke, goes to work for trump and runs his campaign. and we now know that campaign gets help from the russians to help trump, despite what trump now says that's the fact. just those standing alone, you can draw real inferences from that. that manafort was doing this, you know, with either the push or the promise or however you want to phrase it of putin to get in that campaign and then putin would help and he could be very much, he, manafort could be the link. and we don't know all of the ev

couldn't figure it out because paul manafort had people lying for him and that was one person, cindy laporta. she has immunity. it was one of the dryer days being in the court because the prosecution really did go over a lot of the same evidence they have done before particularly on this howard street residence in new york. you could see the jury yawning and stretching in their chairs >> the psychology of a district trial judge in a case that you know was a huge deal. the nation is watching this and also from an appeals perspective, you know there is going to be appeals. how does that affect how you run a courtroom when you are dealing with high stakes, high profile trial. >> it is hard to say in general, but what you would do, if you were concerned if one side was going too slowly or concerned about the scope of the evidence, what you would do is wait until the jury leaves the room and then admonish one side or the other. what you don't do is do this in front of the jury. but let me put the shoe on the other foot. i have no doubt and this is for after my years as a lawyer and my years as a

cindy laporta, a key witness, told jurors in 2016 she sent a fake letter from a shell company to a bank to help paul manafort get a multimillion dollar loan. she also implicated manafort deputy rick gates. she took the actions under his direction. now she was given immunity for exchange for the testimony. rick gates is expected to take the stand early this week. >>> the trump administration will talk about reimposing sanctions on iran. businesses have until midnight tonight to end contracts with the country before sanctions are reinstated. it is expected to include gold appare aluminum as well as steel. we have ramin with the latest from tehran. >> reporter: they can make a miracle, but the people in the streets who have lost purchasing power with the inflation and they won't believe him. he tries his best to give hope and try to portray a promising future. the people have lost the purchasing power already. more than 100%. >> you talk about the very real internal economic pressure that the country is facing. in terms of the impact of the sanctions and sanctions reimposed in november. ho

cindy laporta told the court that she and others helped manafort file supply numbers so that manafort could save hundreds of thousand of dollars in taxes. laporta is the first witness we've heard from so far who is testifying under a limited immunity deal from special counsel robert mueller. prosecutors say manafort used offshore bank accounts to hide millions that he was paid while doing political consulting work in ukraine. he is charged with failing to report those foreign bank accounts and with lying on his tax returns as well as lying on bank loan applications. laporta said in court that she and others at her accounting firm helped change $900,000 as a loan and that saved taxes for manafort in 2014. this is all building toward the big witness, rick gates, who has now flipped to provide testimony against his former boss. we expect gates will testify that he was part of the conspiracy to help manafort hide this money. manafort's lawyers of course are expected to attack gates' testimony by pointing out that he has now pleaded guilty to lying to the fbi. the trial continues on monday

. >> so paul manafort's accountant testified today, carrie, and one of them is cindy laporta who gotmmunity. she said she falsified a $900,000 loan amount so manafort could pay less taxes. is that damning? >> it's very -- it's dramatic. she has been granted immunity so that she would testify and not incriminate herself. she has admitted she knew some of what they were doing was illegal. so i think that testimony probably was very powerful. and the cooperation of the accountants and the bookkeeper, what that does is that provides additional details and context to what i think is really a very document-heavy trial, and a document-heavy case. in other words, most of the serious evidence that will support the elements of the crime, if the jury does find him guilty, will come from the actual documents themselves and the falsified records. someone like this, though, she provides a face and personal knowledge of what was going on behind the scenes. >> so, carrie, this is really a preview of what we're going to hear from the prosecution star witness, rick gates? >> well, in some ways, rick g

the witness prior to gates, who is on the stand right now, former manafort accountant cindy laporta justtified now gates was the one sending her fraudulently drafted financial forms that would eventually serve the purpose of lowering paul manafort's tax bill. she also testified that some of the documents gates was sending her on manafort's behalf were basically laughably fake. she filed or submitted them anyway. including a tax return she said was so wrong she was disturbed by it. laporta was given immunity to testify. gates has not been. but he did decide to cooperated after he pled guilty to lying to the fbi. shep? >> shepard: are there more witnesses after gates or is this thing soon to wra wrap up on the prosecution's side? >> we know the prosecution wants to wrap up at some point this week. we do not know if there is anybody after gates. this is essentially now the third major act of the manafort trial. act one would be last tuesday when the mueller team gets up and they allege that paul manafort lived a very lavish lifestyle and ostrich coats and flower beds snand an m for manafort

cindy laporta is one of the accountants, and she described how her firm, people working for her, with her essentially fudged some of the numbers on behalf of paul manafort in order to reduce his taxes. she said, quote, i very much regretted it appears the reason why she says she did this, fudging the numbers on behalf of paul manafort was because paul manafort was a very important client to her firm, wolf. >> and what about the prosecutors? what are they saying about how manafort actually used the real estate, it was quite sensitive, the real? >> this goes to the heart of the prosecution's case against paul manafort that basically, he was lying on his tax returns, lying to the irs in order to reduce the amount of taxes that he was paying. one of the things, according to the witness testimony we heard today was paul manafort was reporting that he was using at least a couple of the homes that he owned in new york. he was using them personal residences instead of rental property. what this did, wolf, it essentially lowered his taxes when we reported this to the irs. one of the accountant

cindy laporta who is one of his accountants, she talked about how she saw some very suspicious -- some very strange-looking loans, one for $900,000, $1.5 million was another one, and she didn't see all the documentations for these loans, which raise concerns for her. we also heard that from one of his other accountants that he was being asked by paul manafort to assure a bank that one property that he owned on fifth avenue, trump tower property, was being used as his personal residence when, in fact, it was being used as a rental property. of course, that affects his taxes. so according to the government this is the key part of this case, right? that paul manafort lied to his accountan accountants, loo id to his bookkeeper, lied to the fbi. we briefly heard, by the way, brooke, from paul manafort's main defense lawyer, kevin downing today in court and he really kind of focused on the complications of paul manafort's taxes. i think what we're going to get from them, from the defense, is, look, paul manafort was a wealthy guy, his taxes are really, really complicated, jurors don't buy wh

one of manafort's former accountants named cindy laporta damaging testimony she was disturbed by what thee believed to be false information on the manafort tax return that she did submit anyway. and that rick gates, once sent her a microsoft word document that she knew right away was probably fake, but she used it anyway to convince a bank that a 1.5-million-dollar loan in manafort's account had actually been forgiven. the mueller team alleges these wire transfers weren't loans at all but just manafort moving money from overseas accounts to the u.s. and claiming they were loans so he could avoid paying income taxes on them right away the manafort defense team claimed that he never willingly broke any tax laws though. dana. >> dana: peter, what else are we expecting this week? i think this is the second full week of the trial. >> today court started about a half an hour later than planned. but the mueller team has been saying that they plan to rest their case. they plan to lay out everything that they have got against paul manafort and rest by the end of this week. we do expect to see

one of manafort's former accountants named cindy laporta damaging testimony she was disturbed by whatanafort tax return that she did submit

interesting this week the accountants who testified here, particularly cindy laporta. she testified that her firm falsified a loan amount at the request of rick gates to help manafort pay less taxes. does that, joey, play right into the defense that gates was the one facilitating all of this and that manafort didn't know anything about it? >> short answer, christi, absolutely not. you know, big picture, again, on this. i do not understand why he would be, that is, manafort, taking the case to trial. understand that of the 18 counts in the indictment, prosecutors need one victory. do the math from a statistical perspective, and you tell me how you get out from under that. and so, the only thing i could think, again, big picture, is that he's holding out for a pardon. we know that the president doesn't like the investigation. we know the president has stated that he believes manafort's treated unfairly. and so, this could be a very well and academic exercise in as much as after the fact, should he be convicted -- i think he will -- he'll be pardoned. but to your point, l

she is cindy laporta, she got an immunity deal from the special counsel in order to testify and what she represents is an insider, someone who according to prosecutors and her own testimony she was involved in the conspiracy to help paul manafort move some of this money from these offshore accounts and in cyprus that he did not dedlid declare to the irs and then he fudge it had numbers so he could lie on his income taxes. there was one part of the testimony in which she described a loan for $900,000. i think we have the exhibits the government showed in court for a $900,000 loan in 2014 and according to her own testimony, this money was supposed to be classified as income but by classifying it as a loan, it allowed paul manafort to reduce his taxes by as much as a half million dollars for that year. so here we have for the first time someone who is an insider explaining how this conspiracy works. the government has charged him with bank fraud and tax fraud. and what this is building to is they are going move on to other charges. rick gates, his testimony will be a very fiery thing ba

now, that, of course, is cindy laporta. she was on the stand last week. she's back today.nd she could face a very tough cross-examination. of course, she has already testified, very dramatically, and even remorsefully, that she signed off on a plan to put a bogus document into the files of manafort. it was a bogus bank loan. and that bank loan essentially reduced the amount of tax he had to pay. so she could get some tough examination on that. also, as you know, and you talked about at the top, rick gates, the former deputy, the top associate of manafort, he could testify, he could get tough cross-examination too. and it's likely he could be on the stand for a while. back to you. >> joe johns, thank you. we'll be watching, of course, to see if rick gates does take the stand. we'll update you throughout the day. >>> in a matter of hours, sanctions from the united states on iran will be reimposed. this is part of the president with drawing from the iranian nuclear deal. what does it mean for future relations between the country. negotiations. what does it mean for big europe

this witness who testified, cindy laporta, she was one of the witnesses given immunity. she was one of the five given immunity by the special counsel's office. and really, anderson, it was big day for prosecutors. damaging testimony for manafort. she testified that manafort asked her to falsify documents, and some of this activity while he was running the trump campaign in 2016. in one case she said that money that manned for claimed he had in offshore accounts, that it was a loan when in fact it was income that he had made, that by doing so that reduced his taxes by $500,000. there is e-mails of communications between her and paul manafort. really, this is setting up quite the number of witnesses that are going to be coming and really all the evidence that prosecutors seem to have against paul manafort. >> did the accountant explained why she lied for manafort initially? >> yeah, she was regretful, anderson, certainly. she said he was an important client to her and she simply did not want to fight him. she didn't stand up to him. but in the end, really her only reason f

cindy laporta told the court that she and others helped manafort falsify numbers so he could save hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes. laporta also testified she knew the documents were counterfeit. she was granted immunity from prosecution for her testimony. this is all building to the biggest witness to come. manafort's former deputy rick gates, who has now flipped to testify against his former boss. the trial continues on monday. so joining me now to discuss, cnn national security analyst and retired cia chief of russia operations steve hall. former u.s. attorney greg brower. and "time" magazine contributor jay newton small, good to see you all. jay, you first, you know, one week behind us, why does all this seem to make the president so nervous? >> the president certainly is really upset by the manafort trial. you can see it in his tweets, his demeanor. he tweeted last week that he was being treated worse than al capone. that he was being put in isolation in prison. that the whole thing was just a hoax and they should go after hillary instead. so if i were manafort, i'd be please

her name is cindy laporta. she was a longtime accountant for him, and really a big day for prosecutors here in that really what she showed was that manafort had asked her to falsify documents. some of this activity, you know, when he was running the trump campaign in 2016. in one case, she says that he asked her to say that money that he had in offshore accounts was a loan when it was, in fact, income which reduced his taxes by $500,000. there's also all sorts of e-mails that the government used in the case today sort of to show the communications between manafort and this accountant. >> when it comes to roger stone and kristin davis, do we know what mueller's team asked davis about? >> we don't specifically know what was asked, but we do know the special counsel on mueller's team is specifically interested in their relationship. they've been friends for probably a decade. he has known her a long time. he's worked for her. she's worked for him. so certainly something is going on there in that relationship. she

preparer for paul manafort testified today that she fil tax returns she thought contained false in cindy laportao had been granted immunity, acknowledged she might have committed a crime. manafort is accused of bank fraud and tax evasion in the years before he managed the trump campaign. federal prosecutors say they may wrap up their case next week. tennessee voters have chosen the two major pay nominees for a key u.s. senate race in november. reblican congresswoman marsha blackburn and former democratic governor phil bredesen won thursday's primaries. blackburn campaigned as an ally of president trump.es br said he'll chart an independent course, in a state that went heavily for mr. trum in 2016. and on wall street, stocks ended the week on a high note. the dow jones industrial averagt gained 136 pto close at 25,462. the nasdaq rose nine points, and the s&p 500 added 13. still to come on the newshou the way after the historic presidential election in mbabwe. reuniting separated migrant families who is responsible the government or a.c.l.u. >> woodruff: in zimbabwe today, the man who wadeclared

then we saw another tax preparer, cindy laporta, who took over from aliff after he retired. she actually -- tre a reason she has immunity because she was complicit in falsifying these tax s. she said that she was pretty disturbed and that she eventually drew a line where she stopped doing this but she never wanted to report it because as you pointed out, she didn't want to open up her firm to any litigation. but it was really interesting. there's a pattern through all of these witnesses that we've seen that rick gates and paul manafort worked hand in glove. it was not rick gates going out on his own against the wishes of paul manafort who wanted to wash his hands of everything. and that also time and time again, paul manafort both personally in his own individual tax returns and with his company tried to hide and obfuscate what his financial situation was, whether he was trying to act like he had more money so he could get more loans or whether he was trying to erase money from the books so it wasn't obvious how much money was coming in from those foreign bank accounts. >> a

cindy laporta will be cross-examined by the defense.estified that she altered tax and bank documents to lower manafort's tax return and men him ghelp hi loans. she said manafort was in serious debt by 2016. $1 million in clothing debt alone. with manafort trying to use the bank loans to sustain himself financially. still in question, whether rick gates will testify there. joining me now, signor justice correspondent and the our legal analyst back with us as well. so you were in there, and you have to start there, right, ryan. what stood out to you in what happened this week? >> i mean it was sort of amazing. i think what you have to look at if you look at the big picture here is that essentially what manafort's team will have to argue, that there is this tremendous conspiracy that he had no clue about to save him a lot of money on his tax returns. and just not really a believable or plausible scenario. and i think that it will be a challenge once this switches over to the defense side to make that case to the jurors. you had all these s

earlier today one of manafort's former account at that particular times cindy laporta said gates washat were very obviously phony but submitted them to the bank or irs anyway. mueller team alleges it was all part of a scheme designed to lower mr. manafort's tax bill. taxes are complicated he just made a mistake there should being an audit but not a federal case. that's what this trial is focusing exclusively on. allegations of financial crimes. there is no talk about alleged russian collusion or election interfeecious or even about president trump. the mueller team has been saying that they plan to rest their case at some point this week. and they are expected to use gates' intimate knowledge of the manafort operation to advance their ongoing theory that manafort spent extravagantly but skimped on taxes and tricked banks he was working with we do not know how long gates is going to be on the stand. he did just start few minutes ago. manafort is sitting at the defense table just looking at him. trish? >> trish: thank you very much. what should you be making of these new developments w

what about cindy laporta, the tax preparer, bookkeeper who also was testifying. how critical sheedy wall? >> some of us thought she was a good witness. others do not. i believe her. i think she felt contrite about her involvement. i understand why she did it but that didn't make it right. i think she was key to me because we saw the documents. now we know how they got there. >> shannon: what about judge ellis? folks thought he was a character. was he equally tough on both sides? >> i think he would have been equally tough on both sides had the defense been up there more. he appeared tougher to the prosecution simply because the prosecution was up there the most. he said some funny things like for instance, when andres forgot to mention the thing and he came back with a comment about confession is good for the soul. >> shannon: he does have clips and things he says along the wa way. this is something he said before the trial, before you were involved, he's had with the prosecutors you don't really care about mr. manafort's bank fraud. you really care about what in

there was also a fairly dramatic moment before gates took the stand on redirect for the accountant cindy laportahe prosecution seemed to imply that $10 million loan we heard to manafort was actually not a loan but was, in fact, income. so one of the things that manafort's defenders have long said about this case is this isn't about russia. he was paid bayy ukrainians, russians. he was actually paid by russian, oleg. that's the man he was offering private briefings to during the campaign. that is important not really for this trial, but all of us who are following this to try to understand what it means for the russia investigation, nicolle. >> frank figliuzzi, a smart man named ken dilanian once told me follow the money and all these questions about the trump campaign and russia and their ties to it. it seems like the backdrop or sort of the context to be gleaned is that that is precisely what robert mueller's investigators have done. and we're going to understand the entire pathway between paul manafort and the russians who funded him, and maybe we'll have the answer to just why paul manafort w