Michael Mukasey And Rudy Giuliani Probed Over Gold Dealer Accused Of Busting Iran Sanctions
Michael Mukasey Image by Getty Images
A federal judge will inquire further into whether former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani and former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey can represent a Turkish gold trader charged with conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions against Iran.
U.S. District Judge Richard Berman said at a hearing on Tuesday in Manhattan federal court that he will hold another hearing, likely later this month, into whether conflicts of interest prevent the two men from effectively representing the trader, Reza Zarrab.
Giuliani and Mukasey will not appear in court or help prepare for Zarrab’s trial, Benjamin Brafman, another of Zarrab’s lawyers, said at the hearing. Instead, he said, they are seeking a “diplomatic solution” to the case.
The two men traveled to Turkey shortly after Feb. 24 to meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
“No one was trying to hide their involvement,” Brafman said.
Zarrab is accused of conspiring to conduct illegal transactions through U.S. banks on behalf of Iran’s government and other Iranian entities. Prosecutors said in a court filing last week that eight of those banks were clients of Giuliani or Mukasey’s firms, and that Giuliani’s firm is a registered agent of Turkey, raising potential conflicts.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
