Prosecutors shift focus to fraud charges in Manafort trial

ALEXANDRIA, VA. » After three days of dramatic and even salacious testimony in the trial of Paul Manafort, prosecutors Thursday returned to the nuts and bolts of their case against the former Trump campaign chairman as they sought to show he obtained millions of dollars in bank loans under false pretenses.

Attorneys for special counsel Robert Mueller also got a rare — and narrow — acknowledgment from U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III that he likely erred when he angrily confronted them a day earlier over whether he had allowed a witness to watch the trial.

The judge’s comments and detailed testimony about Manafort’s loans opened the eighth day of his trial as prosecutors began presenting the bulk of their bank fraud case against him.

Thursday, a bank employee told jurors how she discovered discrepancies in the information he put on his loan application.