First, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act:
"Sarbanes-Oxley Act: Summary and definition
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (sometimes referred to as the SOA, Sarbox, or SOX) is a U.S. law to protect investors by preventing fraudulent accounting and financial practices at publicly traded companies. Passed in 2002 in the wake of a series of corporate scandals and the bursting of the dot-com bubble, Sarbanes-Oxley imposed a number of reporting, accounting, and data retention mandates to ensure that business practices at big companies remain above board."
The actual charges:
"1. The defendant DONALD J. TRUMP repeatedly and fraudulently falsified New York business records to conceal criminal conduct that hid damaging information from the voting public during the 2016 presidential election.
2. From August 2015 to December 2017, the Defendant orchestrated a scheme with others to influence the 2016 presidential election by identifying and purchasing negative information about him to suppress its publication and benefit the Defendant’s electoral prospects. In order to execute the unlawful scheme, the participants violated election laws and made and caused false entries in the business records of various entities in New York. The participants also took steps that mischaracterized, for tax purposes, the true nature of the payments made in furtherance of the scheme.
3. One component of this scheme was that, at the Defendant’s request, a lawyer who then worked for the Trump Organization as Special Counsel to Defendant (“Lawyer A”),covertly paid $130,000 to an adult film actress shortly before the election to prevent her from publicizing a sexual encounter with the Defendant. Lawyer A made the $130,000 payment through a shell corporation he set up and funded at a bank in Manhattan. This payment was illegal, and Lawyer A has since pleaded guilty to making an illegal campaign contribution and 2served time in prison. Further, false entries were made in New York business records to effectuate this payment, separate and apart from the New York business records used to conceal the payment.
4. After the election, the Defendant reimbursed Lawyer A for the illegal paymentthrough a series of monthly checks, first from the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust (the “Defendant’s Trust”)—a Trust created under the laws of New York which held the Trump Organization entity assets after the Defendant was elected President—and then from the Defendant’s bank account. Each check was processed by the Trump Organization, and each check was disguised as a payment for legal services rendered in a given month of 2017 pursuant to a retainer agreement. The payment records, kept and maintained by the Trump Organization, were false New York business records. In truth, there was no retainer agreement, and Lawyer Awas not being paid for legal services rendered in 2017. The Defendant caused his entities’ business records to be falsified to disguise his and others’ criminal conduct
