The past month has been full of exciting news about the Trump Crime Syndicate. We heard that Florida authorities are trying to figure out what they will have to do if federal authorities (or NY authorities) try to arrest Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago. We also heard that NY state and the Manhattan DA are working concurrent criminal investigations into Trump Org, and the state and city are working together and sharing information. And now this: the Manhattan DA, Cy Vance, has convened a grand jury to decide whether to indict Trump.

Manhattan’s district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict former president Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself, should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development.

The panel was convened recently and will sit three days a week for six months. It is likely to hear several matters — not just the Trump case ­— during its term, which is longer than a traditional New York state grand-jury assignment, these people said. Like others, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. Generally, special grand juries such as this are convened to participate in long-term matters rather than to hear evidence of crimes charged routinely.

The move indicates that District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.’s investigation of the former president and his business has reached an advanced stage after more than two years. It suggests, too, that Vance thinks he has found evidence of a crime — if not by Trump, by someone potentially close to him or by his company.

Vance’s investigation is expansive, according to people familiar with the probe and public disclosures made during related litigation. His investigators are scrutinizing Trump’s business practices before he was president, including whether the value of specific properties in the Trump Organization’s real estate portfolio were manipulated in a way that defrauded banks and insurance companies, and if any tax benefits were obtained illegally through unscrupulous asset valuation. The district attorney also is examining the compensation provided to top Trump Organization executives, people familiar with the matter have said.

In a statement issued Tuesday evening, Trump called the seating of the grand jury “a continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in American history.”

“This is purely political, and an affront to the almost 75 million voters who supported me in the Presidential Election, and it’s being driven by highly partisan Democrat prosecutors,” Trump said. “Our Country is broken, our elections are rigged, corrupt, and stolen, our prosecutors are politicized, and I will just have to keep on fighting like I have been for the last five years!”

[From WaPo]

“Our Country is broken, our elections are rigged, corrupt, and stolen, our prosecutors are politicized…” God I’m so glad that Twitter deplatformed him. Reading that was not good for my blood pressure. Anyway, while grand juries are technically “secret proceedings,” I would expect that we’ll be hearing a lot from and around this grand jury. Cy Vance is the one with all of Trump’s tax returns, so the criminality Vance uncovered is likely financial. But it’s all connected – financial crimes lead to crimes against the country, and the financial crimes were hiding Trump’s payoffs to other criminals and women he abused, threatened and harmed.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Avalon Red.