Paul Manafort’s Lawyers Plead For Lenient Sentence

The Hill reports:

Defense attorneys for Paul Manafort say President Trump’s former campaign chairman should receive a prison sentence that’s significantly less than the maximum 10 years allowed under the law for the two crimes he pled guilty to in D.C.

In a sentencing memo to the federal judge presiding over his criminal case, attorneys say Manafort, 69, has already been punished substantially, by having to forfeit most of his assets and that any additional period of incarceration would likely amount to a life sentence for the first-time offender given his age and health concerns.

Lawyers said the harsh descriptions of his crimes weren’t for “murder, drug cartels, organized crime, the Madoff Ponzi scheme or the collapse of Enron.” And the charges aren’t about “collusion” between the Trump campaign and Russia, which was the core of what Mueller’s office is investigating, his lawyers argued.