Students For
Trump Founder Gets 13 Months For Fake
Lawyer Fraud, Is Urged to Vaccinate
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- ESPN
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
May 11 – The long delayed
sentencing of John Lambert who
"represented himself to
clients as a prominent NY
attorney but had never been to
law school and wasn’t an
attorney" took placed on May
11. Inner City Press live
tweeted it here:
Lambert founded
Students for Trump.
Judge Caproni:
There was a victim named Penn
Little who said he wanted to
speak. He is here? Is he on
the phone? No, he is not here.
But I have a question. Why
didn't the government identify
all the victims? AUSA: We
didn't get a warrant for his
email...
AUSA: We
determined that Mr. Lambert's
victims might have been able
to assert attorney - client
privilege [even though Lambert
was *not* an attorney.] The
government contacted everyone
we identified by PayPal. And
there are victims listening
in.
AUSA: Mr. Lambert
offered his services on UpWork
- he was targeting
unsophisticated consumers of
legal services. "Credit Victim
1" embodies this. Lambert had
him drain his 401(k), and he
didn't have it during COVID.
US wants
sentence of 15 to 21 months.
Now Lambert's
lawyer: He has just trying to
set up a web marketing
company. Somehow it turned
into a fake law firm that
claimed it was based in
Manhattan. His "partner"
claimed to be from there.
Lambert's
lawyer: I asked myself, how
can I represent the founder of
Students for Trump? I asked
him, and he said he would
plead guilty. He met his
co-conspirator at Students for
Trump. He has been ridiculed
in the press and online.
Lambert: I
want to apologize to my
victims. My soul is left
broken. This began in college
when I engaged in student
activism.
Judge
Caproni: You went to schools
affiliated with Liberty
College. You co-founded
Students for Trump. You sat
for interviews with all types
of media organizations. You
are not married and you have
no children. I note you have
made no effort to repay your
victims
Judge
Caproni: You could have gotten
a job and tried to repay. But
you didn't. Fraud is a serious
offense. This took a lot of
thought. You created a cyber
existence to fool people. A
serious sentence here may
deter other young people from
dabbling in fraud.
Judge Caproni: By
all indications you stood up
to people for an unpopular
belief. You stood up to people
who shunned Trump. Your
narrative of being tricked by
your co-conspirator is not
credible. Keeping young people
engaged in our government is
good. Fraud is bad
Judge Caproni: I
find the guideline sentence is
somewhat longer than
necessary. But the sentence
urged by the defendant and
Probation is too low. I'm
going to sentence you to 13
months, then supervised
release of three years.
Lambert's lawyer
asks for designation to a
facility in Pensacola or
Montgomery, Alabama.
Judge Caproni:
You are to surrender on or
before June 25.
I strongly
suggested you get vaccinated
against COVID-19 before then.
The case is US v. Lambert,
19-cr-571 (Caproni)
***
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