New York Times article: “In Case Against Trump’s Company, Echoes of His Father’s Tactics on Taxes”
Excerpt: “Long before Donald J. Trump’s company was accused of plotting detours around the tax code to compensate its chief financial officer with carpeting, televisions and car leases, there were the $16,135 boilers.
The boilers were bought for that amount by Mr. Trump’s father, Fred, in the 1990s for his numerous apartment buildings. But in a bit of financial alchemy that embodied the family ethos of paying as little tax as possible, the elder Mr. Trump used inflated invoices to pay the bill and the extra money was skimmed off for his children — all to avoid gift and inheritance taxes.
Echoes of the earlier scheme could be found in the indictment on Thursday of the Trump Organization and Allen H. Weisselberg, its chief financial officer, who first went to work for Fred Trump in the 1970s.” https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/03/us/weisselberg-fred-trump-invoice-scheme.html
The NYT article suggest that ex-president Trump’s alleged tax evasion was in a way “Knowledge gained through direct experience” through observation of his father.