Opinion ID: 713017
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Bridge Loans.

Text: 30 Zenonas Jurys, one of the founders of Kasa and a member of its supervisory committee, and Rimas Vaicaitis, a professor at Columbia University and former president and a director of Kasa, were both longtime associates of Vebeliunas. In July 1985, Jurys and Vaicaitis each applied for $750,000 loans from Kasa. The applications described the loans as bridge loans, and the loans were repaid shortly after they were made. The funds were to be provided to Vebeliunas to use for business purposes. Neither Jurys nor Vaicaitis had the ability to repay the loans, and Vebeliunas assured them that they would not have to do so. 31 These loans were approved on July 16, 1985, three days before the applications were completed and submitted to Kasa for consideration. To correct this discrepancy, the applications were backdated to July 10 (Vaicaitis) and 11 (Jurys). 32 On July 19 and 20, Vebeliunas signed Litas checks in the amount of $3,000 to the order of Vaicaitis and Jurys, respectively. While these checks were recorded as consulting fees, and Vaicaitis and Jurys testified that they were in payment of obligations for genuine services, the government argued to the jury that the payments were in consideration for their acting as straw borrowers. 33