President Donald Trump could be facing legal issues in
regard to the family’s Westchester estate known as Seven Springs.
The investigation surrounds a conservation easement
donation of 158 acres to a land trust valued at $21 million in 2021. This may
have allowed the Trump Organization to take a tax deduction, which was based on
the property’s value.
That would have made the tax deduction larger then what it
should have been.
News 12’s Scott McGree broke the story late Friday and now
News 12 has confirmed with the Town of North Castle that they’ve given the
Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance financial documents about Seven Springs.
The documents include planning board files, emails and any
correspondence between the town of North Castle and the Trump organization.
The 212-acre property actually is part of three different
towns and was bought by the president in the mid-1990s for $7.5 million.
Dan Schorr is a
former inspector general in Yonkers as well as a former prosecutor in
Westchester and Manhattan. He says while it is
"certainly a very significant step,"
the investigations are still in the very early stages.
"People
shouldn't assume that just because these subpoenas and interviews are
occurring, that there is definitely going to be a prosecution," he says.
Investigators have been halted to the issue because Trump
has been president of the United States, which allows him to delay and/or
postpone lawsuits and investigations about him.
However, Schorr says investigations by the Manhattan DA and
the New York Attorney General could also be ramping up because come Wednesday,
Trump will no longer be president.
"President Trump is going to have to have
his organization respond to information, depositions, other things from law
enforcement that he may not have had to do when he was in the White House,"
he says.