More from the article...

... Jonathan Braun, who was serving a 10-year prison term on drug charges when Trump commuted his sentence in January 2021, is among four lenders who were ordered by a New York judge to cease all collection efforts, refund money to customers and provide a judge with a complete accounting of all funds collected over nearly a decade.

The ruling comes in a lawsuit New York Attorney General Letitia James filed in 2020, claiming Braun and others made thousands of illegal loans disguised as "merchant cash advances" to small businesses, charged annualized interest that sometimes exceeded 1,000% and defrauded and harassed borrowers.

The judge referred to Braun and the other defendants as "predatory lenders" and said in his decision that they gave false information in affidavits in the case.

James's lawsuit targets conduct that occurred before Braun went to prison on the drug charges in January 2020.

Citing a Bloomberg Businessweek report and other evidence, James's office had told the judge that Braun returned to the lending business not long after being released from prison in 2021. ...