I think Cohen became willing to throw Trump under the bus when he realized no pardon bone would come his way. His family is another matter.
Over the past eight months, Cohen’s father-in-law has given at least $20 million in loans to Yasya Shtayner, records examined by the Chicago Sun-Times show. Her family owns Chicago Medallion Management Corp., which manages 368 taxicabs, including 22 owned by Cohen.
Shtayner and her husband Semyon Shtayner — Chicago Medallion Management’s corporate secretary — were identified in a warrant the FBI used to raid Cohen’s law office and home, looking for documents relating to his business interests as well as his $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her from discussing her alleged dalliance with Trump, according to a CNN report. (my emphasis)...Shusterman and the Shtayners, all immigrants from Ukraine to New York City in the 1970s, couldn’t be reached for comment.
Shusterman has a condo in the Trump World Tower near the United Nations in New York. He and Shtayner also owns condos in another Trump development in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, outside Miami. In 1993, Shusterman pleaded guilty to federal income-tax fraud relating to his taxicab business in New York. He paid a $5,000 fine and served two years of probation.
Cohen has 32 taxi medallions in New York City and 22 in Chicago. The Chicago medallions were operated by another problematic individual and former business partner of Cohen named Symon Garber. After splitting with Garber,Cohen became partners with Evgeny Freidman, an immigrant from St. Petersburg, Russia.
Both of Mr. Cohen’s taxi partners had a history of legal run-ins. Each has been made to pay more than $1 million for overcharging their drivers, according to the New York State attorney general. Former business partners also accused each of them of forging signatures, stiffing lawyers and dodging debt collection efforts.
The New York Times reported on Cohen's thorny taxi issues here. After going through all the loans Cohen has taken out, it reports:
It was unclear what Mr. Cohen has done with all the money he has borrowed in recent years. But he received some of the funds around the time that he and his father-in-law, Mr. Shusterman, lent a combined $26 million to a Ukrainian immigrant and taxi-fleet operator named Semyon Shtayner, real estate records show.
The transactions were unusual: Mr. Shtayner has had nearly $1.7 million in judgments and liens against him over the years, yet Mr. Cohen made large loans backed by collateral that appears to be worth less than the value of the loans. Since 2012, Mr. Cohen has lent $6 million to Mr. Shtayner...who recently entered the marijuana cultivation business in Nevada.
Then there are Cohen's medical companies in New York City that "operate on the fringe."
There were two medical practices, an acupuncture office, two medical billing companies, two management companies and a transportation company. Mr. Cohen sold 172 Rivington Street, left, for $10 million in cash in 2014. That same day, he sold three other buildings in cash transactions. The total price for the four buildings was $32 million, nearly triple what he had paid for them in the span of no more than three years.
...The ventures were noteworthy, in part, because they were created at a time when countless phony companies were cropping up to exploit so-called no-fault auto insurance laws in New York and other states. Hundreds of doctors, businesses owners and others would eventually be criminally charged or accused of fraud by insurance companies.
Cohen did not get charged in the scams.
The no-fault insurance schemes, which were often masterminded by organized crime figures from the former Soviet Union, all followed a basic template. Staged or exaggerated car accidents were used to generate a tidal wave of “patients.” Transportation companies then took the patients — often low-level criminals — to what in many instances were sham medical clinics, diagnostic testing offices, and acupuncture and physical therapy offices. Billing companies were created to collect money from insurers, and management companies then siphoned the funds out to the scheme’s operators. Some operators were so bold that they sued insurers that had stopped paying after they realized they were being defrauded.
While Cohen was not charged, two of the doctors who signed the incorporation papers for his medical practice were charged in connection with different medical practices.
Dr. Martirosov was arrested and charged with insurance fraud and grand larceny in 2003. A little more than a year earlier, Mr. Cohen had registered Avex Medical Care in Dr. Martirosov’s name.
In 2005, Dr. Kanevsky was indicted on state racketeering charges, the result of a lengthy wiretap investigation into phony accidents and medical claims. Mr. Cohen had registered Life Quality Medical Care on Dr. Kanevsky’s behalf in April 2002. Dr. Kanevsky pleaded guilty to scheming to defraud in the second degree.
The charges against Dr. Martirosov were later dropped, but he was named in a civil RICO suit by Allstate "accused dozens of doctors and business owners of trying to defraud insurers."
Then there's Cohen's personal injury practice.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Mr. Cohen’s personal injury practice filed hundreds of lawsuits largely stemming from auto accidents. For part of that time, a bustling bullpen of clerks and paralegals worked the phones at his Long Island City office. They sought settlements with insurers and churned out suits on behalf of clients, many of whom were referred to clinics that were later caught up in no-fault insurance fraud investigations.
In one case he filed, both his client and the defendant ended up being charged with insurance fraud.
There's also his real estate investments. Between 2011 and 2015, he used limited liability companies to buy 5 Manhattan buildings with "unconventional" funding." He sold 4 of them on the same day for cash, making huuge profits. This was Cohen's explanation.
So this is why I suspect the matters about which Cohen refused to provide information pertain to his and his family's financial dealings. He seems willing enough to give up Trump, but not his family jewels. Three years in Otisville is a kiss for him. Cooperating his way paid off.
I think Manafort will get a different kiss, in the form of a commutation (to time served). As may Rod Blagojevich who is still serving his 14 year uber-sentence. His wife says she hopes he'll be home by Christmas. After all, it happened for Sholom Rubashkin, the meat plant owner in Iowa serving 27 years whom Trump pardoned last December.