Letitia James

Lying Rep. George Santos (R-NY) was hounded by the media during his first day in Congress.

Video posted to Twitter showed Santos ignoring reporters while walking around the halls of the congressional building. The reporter asks him how his constituents can trust him despite his lying about extensive parts of his past and what he thinks about calls for him to be investigated by the House Ethics Committee.

With a new Congress being seated on Tuesday, January 3, 2023, the lame duck period on Capitol Hill is officially coming to an end. And the January 6 Select Committee is now a thing of the past. But the Committee went out with a bang in late 2022, delivering an in-depth 850-page report on the January 6, 2021 insurrection and four federal criminal referrals for former President Donald Trump.

Whether or not the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), which has been conducting two Trump-related investigations under special counsel Jack Smith, will follow the Committee’s recommendations remains to be seen; the DOJ has the option of either following them or not following them. But Trump is certainly entering 2023 facing a variety of criminal and civil investigations, from the DOJ to Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis to New York Attorney General Letitia James to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

In a column for the Daily Beast, longtime investigative journalist and Donald Trump biographer David Cay Johnston made the case that there is enough evidence of financial fraud in the former president's tax returns from 2015 to 2020 to indict and prosecute him.

At issue, he noted, are deductions taken for Trump companies -- some of which may never have existed.

Although many of former President Donald Trump’s allies have faced criminal charges — including “War Room” host Steve Bannon, GOP operatives Roger Stone and Paul Manafort, former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg — Trump himself has never faced any type of criminal indictment. Trump, now 76, survived former special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation, was found “not guilty” in two impeachment trials, and still inspires plenty of fear in the Republican Party.

Nonetheless, Trump is facing multiple criminal or civil investigations, from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to Fulton County, Georgia DA Fani Willis to New York State Attorney General Letitia James. The January 6 Select Committee, wrapping up its work, recommended four federal criminal charges to the DOJ — although it remains to be seen whether or not special counsel Jack Smith, appointed by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, will follow any of those recommendations.

This hasn't been the best year for Donald Trump, and next year is shaping up to be even worse.

The former president's company was convicted of tax fraud this month and faces civil charges from New York attorney general Letitia James, he faces possible prosecution from the Department of Justice and in the state of Georgia -- and his political fortunes seem to be slipping with Republicans, reported CNN.

A judge in Florida on Wednesday shot down former President Donald Trump's attempt to delay handing over documents to the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James.

As reported by Law and Crime News' Adam Klasfeld, Judge Donald Middlebrooks of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida denied Trump's request that he temporarily block James' ability to request documents about his trust as part of her civil lawsuit that alleges fraud conducted over a period of decades by the Trump Organization.

The House Select Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riots held its final hearing on Monday, but the committee's work appears to be far from finished.

As reported by Punchbowl News, the committee has begun cooperating "extensively" with the United States Department of Justice after wrapping up the first phase of its work, including sending information to recently appointed special counsel Jack Smith.

According to a lawsuit brought by a former aide, New York Attorney General Letitia James continued to employ her longtime chief of staff in spite of his “known propensity to sexually harass and to commit sexual assault and batteries,” The New York Times reports.

Sofia Quintanar filed the lawsuit against James, her campaign, the office of the attorney general and Ibrahim Khan, who was once her chief of staff. Khan resigned over accusations that he groped and kissed Quintanar and at least one other former employee of James’s office. The lawsuit seeks damages for loss of income, embarrassment, and pain and suffering.

Former President Donald Trump is still linked to a class action lawsuit against ACN Opportunity, LLC, which operates under the name American Communications Network. According to the accusations, the ACN company was a pyramid scheme that broke state and federal laws around "racketeering and conspiracy to racketeer."

Law & Crime reported that the lawsuit began six years ago, citing ads showing the Trump family promoting the scheme on NBC's Celebrity Apprentice. Judge Lorna Schofield set the date for the trial for Jan. 29, 2024, just as the presidential campaigns are getting started. The plaintiff's attorney had asked for a trial that would happen prior to the election season. But it was ignored.

The Trump Organization was held in contempt of court and fined $4,000 in a secret ruling made public after two of its affiliates were convicted of tax fraud.

The company owned by Donald Trump was found by Judge Juan Manuel Merchan to have willfully disobeyed four grand jury subpoenas and three court orders that held up an investigation by Manhattan prosecutors, according to a ruling reported by the Associated Press.

In an interview with Politico's Erin Durkin, a former prosecutor who served in the New York State Anti-Corruption Office claimed the Trump Organization faces financial hardship and an inability to operate as they have in the past after being convicted on 17 felony counts.

In a review of executives at the former president's signature company after the trial in a Manhattan court ended with a guilty verdict on every count related to a "tax-dodging executive-compensation scheme," the report notes that companies and banks who work, or have worked, with the company may shun dealing with the company or find there are roadblocks to partnering with the Trumps.

Ivanka Trump won't be placed under the watchful eye of a court monitor who will oversee the Trump Organization to prevent the company from reorganizing to avoid a fraud lawsuit.

The New York attorney general's office and a state judge agreed to exclude the former president's eldest daughter from the recent order authorizing a retired federal judge to monitor the company's dealings to ensure it stops lying to banks and insurers, but Ivanka Trump distanced herself from the company and her family in her filing, reported The Daily Beast.

The fine that the Trump Organization will be forced to pay in the New York case is not tax-deductible, quipped New York Times reporter Susanne Craig about the recent 17 guilty verdicts. She went on to explain that listening to the trial it became very clear that the idea that only CFO Allen Weisselberg got the fringe benefits were not believable.

This happens amid the possibility that the Manhattan District Attorney could levy a case he'd been criticized for putting aside, which could result in a $250 million fine. In this case, it is no more than $1.7 million.