An indictment against the business, the Trump Organization, and a top executive, Allen Weisselberg, could come as soon as this week in Manhattan.
Lawyers for Donald J. Trump ’s family business mounted a last-ditch effort on Monday to fend off criminal charges against the company, meeting with Manhattan prosecutors investigating whether it had awarded valuable benefits to a top executive without paying taxes, according to people with knowledge of the matter. At a meeting with senior officials with the Manhattan district attorney’s office and the New York state attorney general’s office, defense lawyers pointed to the harm that the business, the Trump Organization, could face if it were indicted, including damage to its relationships with banks and business partners, the people said. Meetings to discuss this kind of fallout of a criminal indictment, called collateral consequences, are routine in white-collar investigations and often indicate that charges are near. The prosecutors did not inform the defense lawyers if they had made a final decision on whether to charge the Trump Organization, said the people, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss a private meeting. The company has long denied wrongdoing. The meeting, which lasted less than an hour over a video call, came after the prosecutors warned the Trump Organization that they were considering indicting the company and its long-serving chief financial officer, The New York Times previously reported. The district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., could announce charges against the company and the executive, Allen H. Weisselberg, as soon as this week, The Times has reported. The case would mark the first criminal charges to emerge from Mr. Vance’s long-running investigation, which his prosecutors have been conducting along with lawyers from the office of the New York State attorney general, Letitia James.
