The New York attorney general’s office said the National Rifle Association and its top executives engaged in mass corruption and should pay back to the organization millions of dollars spent on personal expenses during closing arguments of the group’s civil corruption trial on Thursday, reports CNN. The jury is deliberating Friday in a case that spotlights one of the most powerful lobbying groups.
The defendants – the NRA, former CEO Wayne LaPierre, former CFO Wilson “Woody” Philips and general counsel John Frazer – were caught “with their hands in the cookie jar, Assistant Attorney General Monica Connell said. Connell said LaPierre engaged in a long history of corruption by spending money on private planes, cars, five-star hotels, hundreds of thousands of dollars of clothing, million-dollar deals to insiders, and payments to loyal board members using money meant for charity use. The NRA’s contract with its former advertising firm MMP increased every time LaPierre or his wife spent time on the yacht of the owners of Ackerman McQueen, an MMP entity, she said. From 2015 through 2022, the NRA paid MMP entities $109 million. “We’re talking about trust of NRA donors” and members who gave hard-earned money to charity, Connell said. LaPierre’s attorney Kent Correll argued that the former CEO “wasn’t interested in building a big pile of money for himself" but rather using it for the interest of the NRA. Correll also said that the New York attorney general's role in the case stemmed from political motivations.