He was once former President Donald Trump’s personal attorney and “fixer,” but now Michael Cohen has some less-than-pleasant news for Trump. New York Attorney General Letitia James’ enormous fraud lawsuit will “financially destroy him” and could ultimately culminate in a prison sentence, Cohen said.

The civil suit James has filed is a massive one, encompassing Trump, his business, and his three eldest children, Insider reports. James hopes to permanently ban the Trumps from conducting business in New York and she’s also seeking at least $250 million in damages.

Cohen, in the run-up to releasing his second book Revenge, spoke to Salon and noted:

“Right now, that case will financially destroy him.”

And, additional penalties may wind up exceeding the $250 million baseline, he added.

Cohen, who has done a stint in prison in 2019 after pleading to tax fraud and campaign finance violations also said the fraud case could lead to criminal charges. At one point he was asked if the lawsuit may lead to the former president being “perp-walked,” he said, “yes, I do.”

Insider notes that Trump won’t go to prison if he loses the civil case. But there’s a footnote in the lawsuit that James plans to refer her findings to federal prosecutors and they may well open a criminal investigation into bank fraud.

“Donald Trump has committed tax evasion, bank fraud, wire fraud, misrepresentation,” Cohen told Salon. “He will not be able to get past that, and that is criminal.”

Trump being the blowhard he always is, continues to play the victim, insisting he hasn’t committed any financial wrongdoing and he’s now decided James is the one who’s conducting a “witch hunt” (he likes that term.)

Cohen is deservedly receiving credit for helping to launch the investigation into his former boss’s New York business dealings. This is, of course, not lost on James.

“I will remind everyone that this investigation only started after Michael Cohen, the former lawyer, his former lawyer testified before Congress and shed light on this misconduct,” James said in September.

Testifying before the House Oversight Committee in 2019, Cohen noted:

“It was my experience that Mr. Trump inflated his total assets when it served his purposes, such as trying to be amongst the wealthiest people in Forbes and deflated his assets to reduce his real estate taxes.”

James’s complaint issues a similar argument. None of this is surprising. This is a man who can’t stand being out of the limelight, so it’s no surprise if he boasts about his wealth but it’s also no surprise if he tries to hide from the suggestion of impropriety.

That is the very essence of Trump.