United States President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort was on Friday sent to jail after a federal judge revoked his house arrest in connection with trials against him on charges of money laundering and bank frauds, AP reported.
Manafort has been accused of tampering with potential witnesses while on bail. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson’s order makes Manafort the first Trump campaign official to be jailed.
US Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating an alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 presidential election, said Manafort had contacted witnesses by phone and encrypted messages, seeking to secure “materially false testimony”.
Reporters who attended Friday’s hearing quoted Berman as saying that she could not “turn a blind eye” to the fact that he had “abused the trust placed” in him and treated the court proceedings as “just another marketing exercise”.
Manafort is indicted in federal courts in Washington and Virginia with allegations of money laundering, failing to register as a foreign agent working on behalf of Ukraine’s former pro-Russia President Viktor Yanukovych, bank and tax fraud. Manafort has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
He will remain in jail while he awaits trial in Washington and Virginia.
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