that not only did they get questioned as a corporation about this deal with michael cohen, but their previous ceo, who quit unexpectedly last fall, and he is being blamed now for having set up this deal with michael cohen, the company is now admitting this they re previous ceo, he also was personally interviewed by the lawyers from mueller s office. novartis has had its own problems with corruption. two years ago they paid $25 million to settle an investigation that they bribed people in china to help their business. the year before that novartis agreed to pay almost $400 million for to settle what was essentially a bribery scam, a kickback scam to boost their drug sales in the united states. just last month reuters reported that novartis is under investigation again in the nation of greece this time for another bribery and kickback scheme. so whether it whether or not it is surprising to see a company like that in the middle of this michael cohen story trying to get away for a sec
the year before that novartis agreed to pay almost $400 million for to settle what was essentially a bribery scam, a kickback scam to boost their drug sales in the united states. just last month reuters reported that novartis is under investigation again in the nation of greece this time for another bribery and kickback scheme. so whether it whether or not it is surprising to see a company like that in the middle of this michael cohen story trying to get away for a second with calling him a health care policy consultant and then telling us the story that they just put him on the payroll for $1.2 million for a year for nothing, whether or not it s surprising to see them in the middle of this scandal, honestly, what is surprising to me, for a company like this, with that recent legal history that they ve got, they haven t figured out how to make innocent-sounding public statements when they get accused of being involved in something this shady? you haven t figured out that your first
it has since been reported that vekselberg s american cousin who runs that investment firm associated with renova, his american cousin has also been questioned in the special counsel s investigation. it s the cousin s firm that reportedly paid cohen. that said the firm is denying any connection between vekselberg himself and the payments to michael cohen. the company does confirm that they paid michael cohen. they say they paid him as a business consultant. they say they paid him as a business consultant, quote, regarding potential sources of capital. question number one, why do we know this stuff? michael avenatti somehow got access to these financial transactions now. and they re at least partially confirmed, these detailed financial records about this secretive business entity associated with michael cohen. other news agencies have been able to obtain financial documents which they say on excuse me, which they say corroborate avenatti s reporting. and we ve had a whole day of
along the way this important and potentially promising company that might have this really big contract coming its way from the u.s. government, this company that s had a very major very recent, very big corruption problem, they got steered somehow to drop 150 large in michael cohen s bank account, specifically into the secret llc he set up to handle the secret payments to the porn star. i think we can all now join hands and go out on a limb together and say that whatever happened here with this aviation company, it was not that michael cohen was personally helping that company get its accounting practices up to international standards. can we all agree that we can go out on that limb together? since michael avenatti posted these detailed financial allegations about michael cohen online last night, it has cracked open a whole lot of news. the giant telecom company at&t has confirmed that it, too, did pay michael cohen. avenatti s document had at&t down for $200,000 paid to michael cohe
the difference between those two price, between the fake price and the real price is actually money that they just pocketed themselves. so this is an important company in that country, right? a singular role in their manufacturing sector, and it s got important national security implications, both because the entity they were ripping off was their own military, but also because the ability to manufacture aircraft, particularly military aircraft is an important part of any country s national defense. and in south korea, that is a fraught issue at the moment for of course reasons. so, that scandal, what happened with that aircraft manufacturing company last year, that was always going to be a big deal scandal. but it end upped being more dramatic and tragic than most. the ceo of that company wasn t just fired in this scandal, he was arrested, and the vice president of the company killed himself as prosecutors closed in and started to uncover the fraud. now the company in question was