Jonathan Braun, whose sentence for drug smuggling was commuted in the final hours of the Trump presidency, was fined over separate accusations that he bilked and threatened borrowers.

When President Donald J. Trump, in his final hours in the White House in early 2021, commuted a 10-year drug smuggling sentence being served by a New Yorker named Jonathan Braun, he made no mention of Mr. Braun’s many other legal problems.

Months earlier, the Federal Trade Commission and the New York State attorney general had filed suits against Mr. Braun saying he swindled and intimidated borrowers who had taken money from a network of predatory lenders he ran, charging usurious interest rates and making violent threats.

On Tuesday, a federal judge in New York imposed $20 million in fines on Mr. Braun after finding him liable for the accusations made by the trade commission. Judge Jed S. Rakoff of the Federal District Court in Manhattan excoriated Mr. Braun in the ruling, depicting him as a hardened, craven man who “gleefully, with little remorse,” boasted about his illegal conduct and treated it as a “laughing matter” as he threatened the business owners he gouged.

Non-paywall link

  • Ejh3k@lemmy.worldEnglish
    33·
    9 months ago

    In a lot of pardoned or commuted sentences, it can come down to someone who had the book thrown at them over something relatively minor, and they have served a large portion of their sentences. Or, if conviction is dodgy.

    Sometimes it comes down to if the person has well and truly changed their ways. And usually, the person asking for the pardon doesn’t have any other legal problems unresolved.

    Like if someone got caught with a couple ounces of marijuana, and the judge wanted to make an example of them, and gave them 57 years. And they’ve done 15, and marijuana is now legal in that state.

    Or maybe someone was in a car, and the driver pulled a gun and shot someone, and they got charged with murder because they were an accessory because they were present.

    I can come up with tons of scenarios, but typically, the commutation or pardoning of a sentence isn’t taken lightly and a lot of evidence is presented as to why the person should be let go. But with trump, he’s a dead brained fuck and someone probably gave him $500 bucks and told him this guy would give him lots of money if he got out.

    The system of pardoning isn’t really the issue at hand, it was the person issuing the pardon that was the problem.