On the heels of the first federal bankruptcy trial of the National Rifle Association, New York Attorney General Letitia James’s (D)’s office ordered a judge not to allow the gun group to try to adjourn the proceedings to dissolve them.
James Sheehan, the head of the Attorney – General’s Charity Bureau, called on the NRA’s request for the efforts by their federal bankruptcy proceedings as fiddlers.
“The apparent attempt by the NRA to automatically stop this action by filing a bankruptcy notice is precisely the kind of procedural abuse that should alleviate the exercise of jurisdiction by state and federal courts,” Sheehan said Wednesday. wrote a letter.
Less than a week ago on January 15, the NRA announced that it was ‘DUMPING New York’ by ‘using the bankruptcy court protection’ to re-establish itself as a non-profit Texas. Federal bankruptcy proceedings are moving fast in the Northern District of Texas, where a trial is scheduled for 2 p.m. Central Time.
The troubled gun group has been fighting for its life since the New York Attorney General filed a 163-page complaint accusing four of its current and former directors of ‘pervasive and systemic illegal conduct’.
Claim the NRA leader Wayne LaPierre used the group as a ‘personal piggy bank’, and the lawsuit outlined its private plane trips to the tropics and African safaris with donor money. The attorney general has accused NRA executives of pocketing millions for their personal benefit, submitting false government documents, awarding non-show contracts to loyalists and taking revenge on whistleblowers.
When the NRA claims to end New York, James stresses that her quest for the group will not end.
“The alleged financial status of the NRA has finally reached its moral status: bankruptcy,” James wrote in a statement at the time. “While reviewing this submission, we will not allow the NRA to use this or any other tactic to evade the liability and oversight of my office.”
James made it clear that the NRA’s bankruptcy dossier was in conflict with their self-confessed financial health.
“The NRA has explicitly stated that it wants to leave New York, its nearly 150-year-old statute, to escape the authority of this court and the supervision of the Attorney General, who he falsely accuses of ‘abuse of legal and regulatory power. , “” reads the five-page letter. “The NRA claims that the bankruptcy is not financially motivated, and claims that the organization is ‘in its strongest financial condition in years’.”
The NRA has no offices in Texas but has reported a location via a subsidiary, Sea Girt, LLC, the attorney general said.
Normally, bankruptcy proceedings disrupt enforcement actions like these, but James says her actions fall under two exceptions to protect the public from fraud and the abuse of a charity. This is how her office describes the exception:
As for the test for money purposes, none of the Attorney General’s claims involve any interest of the State of New York in property owned by the NRA, but attempt to comply with state law governing the administration of the NRA. as a state charter control, enforce. non-profit charity. Claims for financial restitution of charitable assets are against the individual defendants only. Any monies recovered by the Attorney General will be returned to the NRA, or, after a judicial dissolution, used in accordance with the donor’s intent or with the court prescription and approval for a purpose substantially consistent with the mission of the NRA. With regard to the public policy test, the Attorney General does not assess private rights against the NRA, but enforces New York law that protects the public and undefined charities as a class from fraud and misconduct by public charities.
If the NRA fails to interrupt the New York proceedings, the group will go to court again on Thursday for a motion to dismiss. Their lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Read the NYAG letter below:
(Photo by Alex Wong / Getty Images)
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