Rick Gates was destroyed on cross
Mueller’s bluff is being called.
He probably thought Manafort would fold and accept plea deal and roll on Trump, making up lies about POTUS that Mueller could use.
Manafort didn’t roll, and now Mueller has no choice but to pursue the case without looking like an obvious fraud. Better to get hammered in court than to admit you were wrong.
That's why prosecutors are trying to make the jury jealous of Manafort’s lifestyle.
He’s been expertly painted as a liar and thief. Thereby, demonstrating that he has no integrity and anything that comes out of his mouth should not be believed. As Dershowitz has been saying, you can tell what happened or you can compose what happened. I’m thinking that Gates was trying to recite, as best he could, all the lies the DOJ and FBI wanted him to tell. Too bad that Manafort knows all about him.
No matter how you shake it, jurors do not go into cases completely blind to what is going on in the world, especially when it comes to high profile cases such as this. With the press doing its level best to turn this against the President they let way too much out in the public. Other than some accounting details, here and there, there isn’t much the jurors are going to find out other than what they already know. And when your crack team of federal prosecutors are showing a man’s wardrobe, in an effort to use class warfare against the defendant, you know that case is weaker than a fart in a fan factory.
The fact that he embezzeled monies tells me that HE had more say over the books than Manafort. And the bookkeeper wasn’t honest either. Gates had to know that but doesn’t mean Manafort knew she was doing some cheating.
Rick Gates guilty of subornation of perjury, just like Ted Stephens case.