Manafort sentenced to 7½ years for fraud, conspiracy

WASHINGTON — Once a globetrotting lobbyist and consultant to presidents, Paul Manafort was sentenced Wednesday to federal prison for the second time in seven days, giving him a total sentence of 7½ years.

And soon after he left court in a wheelchair to return to the cell in Alexandria, Virginia, where he has been held, prosecutors in New York announced a 16-count grand jury indictment charging the former Trump campaign chairman with mortgage fraud, falsifying business records and conspiracy.

Trump would not be able to pardon Manafort, 69, on the state charges – which separates them from the federal cases for which Manafort was just sentenced.

In court Wednesday, Judge Amy Berman Jackson criticized Manafort and his defense attorneys for repeatedly casting his hard fall from power as collateral damage from the special counsel investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign.

“This defendant is not public enemy number one, but he’s also not a victim either,” Jackson said. “There’s no question this defendant knew better, and he knew exactly what he was doing.”

Outside the courthouse, Manafort attorney Kevin Downing called the sentence “callous, hostile and totally unnecessary.”

He emphasized that the judge, however, had acknowledged that there was “no evidence of any collusion with Russia in this case.”

Downing was repeatedly interrupted by protesters shouting “liar!” and “traitor!”

Jackson herself called the defense’s repeated claims about the lack of collusion with the Russian government “a non-sequitur.”