Leading US real estate lawyer admits perjury

Leonard Grunstein, formerly of international firm Troutman Sanders, is to be sentenced in February for perjury in the third degree after pleading guilty to the crime.

New York: hearings Songquan Deng

He has also made a plea agreement which will mean that he can never be readmitted to the New York State Bar, from which he has resigned. He has also agreed with the District Attorney of New York City that he will be recommended for a conditional discharge, 150 hours of community service and a $1,000 fine. He will escape, if the judge agrees, the maximum penalty of a year in prison. 

False statement

The perjury took place during a complicated property deal. He said in his guilty plea: 'On January 25, 2011 I testified at a deposition in the civil matters at a law office in Manhattan.  Prior to giving my testimony, I affirmed before a notary public that I would testify truthfully.  During the deposition, however, I intentionally made a false statement that I did not believe to be true. I testified at that deposition that, in the summer of 2009, I told Jack Boese that the $100 million loan had not been funded, a relevant fact, when in truth I did not have that conversation with Boese.' Source: New York Observer

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