When it emerged that Don Jr., Kushner and Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign manager, had met Veselnitskaya in 2016 to discuss damaging information she might have on Hillary Clinton, it was claimed that the Moscow lawyer had no ties to Putin’s government.
U. S. prosecutors indicted Veselnitskaya in January 2019 over similar allegations. They claim she secretly worked with the Russian Prosecutor General’s office to draft a document which was shared with the U. S. under the mutual legal assistance treaty.
It is already alleged in the court papers submitted on January 17, 2022- first reported by Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger-that Veselnitskaya edited the transcript of an interview carried out in Moscow by Victor K and Lamon, which took place at the Prosecutor General’s office. That official transcript was handed to the Swiss prosecutors.
The submission to the court was made by Hermitage Capital, which is owned by U.S.-born businessman Bill Browder. The Russian government has claimed-without foundation-that Browder and Magnitsky were really the men behind the fraud.
Veselnitskaya acted as the lawyer for Denis Katsyv, a key figure in the U.S. indictment. The son of a former Moscow regional transport minister, he was sole owner of Prevezon Holdings, which was named in the U.S. indictment alleging that some proceeds from the tax fraud scheme were laundered through the purchase of New York City real estate.
Magnitsky was a Russian lawyer and auditor who in 2007 and 2008 uncovered an alleged vast corruption scheme involving about $230 million, according to a federal indictment by the U.S. Southern District of New York in 2013. The alleged tax fraud scheme came at the expense of an investment firm, Hermitage Capital, owned by an American investor, Bill Browder, according to the U.S. indictment.
Donald Trump Jr. reportedly received an email indicating information to be revealed in a meeting with a Russian lawyer was part of a Russian government effort to help his dad's campaign, according to The New York Times.
The complex backstory here involves Bill Browder, an investment fund CEO who had a great deal of business in Russia before the Russian government turned against his company and essentially forced him out of the country in the mid-2000s.
In 2014, as the money laundering action unfolded, the Russian government’s prosecutor general’s office sent the US a document outlining its supposed “investigative findings” in the case.
Members of the Senate Intelligence Committee said on Monday they want to talk with Trump Jr. about the meeting. Trump Jr. tweeted that he was "happy to work with the committee to pass on what I know."
The sanctions spurred a response from the Kremlin that included a similar blacklist in Russia — and also included a provision that bars Americans from adopting Russian children.