Tag Archives: Avenatti

US

Michael Avenatti sentenced to 14 years in prison for defrauding clients, tax fraud

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SANTA ANA, Calif. (KABC) — Former celebrity lawyer Michael Avenatti, who rose to fame representing adult-film actress Stormy Daniels in her litigation against former President Donald Trump, was sentenced in Orange County to 14 years in federal prison for tax and wire fraud.

U.S. District Judge James Selna said Avenatti’s sentence will run consecutively — or on top of — the five years he is already serving for convictions in New York for an extortion scheme against Nike, and for stealing from Daniels. He has been in prison since February.

Avenatti, 51, was sentenced Monday for “defrauding his clients and for obstructing IRS efforts to collect payroll taxes from his coffee business,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said on Twitter. He was ordered to pay nearly $11 million in restitution to four clients and the Internal Revenue Service after pleading guilty in June to four counts of wire fraud and one count of tax fraud.

Federal prosecutors in Santa Ana had asked Selna to impose a 17 1/2- year term, while Avenatti was arguing for only six years. Prosecutors presented in court the lavish lifestyle Avenatti led with the stolen cash, including the purchases of a private jet and sports cars, as the clients he stole from struggled to make ends meet.

Geoffrey Johnson was one of two victims to give a statement in court.

“I’ve learned not to trust people more than they deserve,” he said.

In his khaki prison uniform, the once boasting celebrity lawyer broke down in tears in federal court and pleaded for mercy – just before he was sentenced to 14 years in prison.

In their sentencing recommendation, federal prosecutors said Avenatti’s schemes followed a “general pattern” in which he “would lie about the true terms of the settlement agreement he had negotiated for the client, conceal the settlement payments that the counterparty had made, secretly take and spend the settlement proceeds that belonged to the client, and lull the client into not complaining or investigating further by providing small advances’ on the supposedly yet-to-be-paid funds.”

Prosecutors called Avenatti was a “tax cheat,” and cited his failure to pay payroll taxes after his firm acquired Tully’s Coffee in bankruptcy and then obstructed the IRS when the agency attempted to collect the amount due.

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US

‘A conman, a liar and a thief’: Avenatti guilty of stealing $300,000 from Stormy Daniels

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Michael Avenatti has been found guilty of defrauding Stormy Daniels of nearly $300,000 (£221,000) in a Manhattan federal court.

Avenatti, 50, stared straight ahead as the jury returned guilty verdicts on wire fraud and aggravated identity theft charges.

He now faces up to 20 years in prison for stealing part of an $800,000 (£590,000) advance Ms Daniels was owed for her 2018 autobiography Full Disclosure, and forging her signature in a contract.

Outside court, Avenatti said he was “very disappointed in the jury’s verdict”.

“I’m looking forward to a full adjudication of all the issues on appeal.”

Judge Jesse Furman ordered Avenatti to surrender to US Marshalls in California on Monday.

Avenatti has delayed beginning a 2.5 year prison sentence for his 2020 conviction in an extortion case while waiting for the book proceeds trial and the retrial of a fraud case in a California federal court.

Prosecutors said it was likely Ms Daniels would speak at his sentencing on 24 May.

Michael Avenatti and Stormy Daniels outside a Manhattan federal court in 2018

(Associated Press)

In a statement released shortly after the verdicts, Ms Daniels’s lawyer Clark Brewster said she was “relieved this nightmare is over”.

“The text communications between Stormy and Mr Avenatti in real time was overwhelming proof of his receipt and embezzlement.

“The forgery of her name and his concealed directive to wire the money to him was irrefutable.

“Still, Mr Avenatti possessed the uncanny ability to steadfastly deny the crimes and persuade others he was entitled to the embezzled funds.

“Stormy is pleased that the justice system works.”

WhatsApp messages between Stormy Daniels and Michael Avenatti provided ‘overwhelming proof’ of his guilt

(US District Attorney’s Office)

The jury reached a verdict just before 1500 local time [2000 GMT] on Friday after more than a day of deliberations. 

Earlier, they returned a note suggesting that one female juror had been holding out, and that she was refusing to deliberate with other panellists.

During the two-week trial, prosecutors said the California lawyer cheated Ms Daniels of nearly $300,000 she was owed for her autobiography, spending it on his firm’s payroll and personal expenses.

Avenatti argued that he was owed the money and never thought it was wrong to take it.

After firing his public defenders on day two of the trial, he cross-examined Ms Daniels about her ability to speak to dead people and “dark entities that prowled” her former New Orleans home as he attempted to shatter her credibility.

Michael Avenatti cross-examines witness Stormy Daniels during his criminal trial at the United States Courthouse in Manhattan

(Reuters)

In a tweet after the verdicts were reached, former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen said: “Justice has been served. Michael Avenatti has shown himself to be what I have always known him to be… a conman, a liar and a thief.”

Avenatti helped secure the book deal for Ms Daniels in spring 2018, shortly after he began representing her in lawsuits meant to free her from the rules of a 2016 payment of $130,000 she had received from President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Mr Cohen to remain silent about an alleged affair with Mr Trump a decade before. The hush-money payment occurred just days before Mr Trump was elected president in 2016. He has denied the claims by Ms Daniels.

Mr Avenatti used his heightened profile at the time to make frequent appearances on cable television news programmes.

Ms Daniels, a porn actress who has also earned stage credits in two mainstream movies, testified during the trial that she never authorised Mr Avenatti to pocket some of the $800,000 advance on her autobiography, Full Disclosure, which was published in the fall of 2018.

Associated Press contributed to this report

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US

Michael Avenatti on trial over handling of Stormy Daniels’ book deal

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The former lawyer, a pugnacious Trump critic who once considered a presidential run of his own, fell from grace after being hit with three federal indictments in a six-week period in 2019.

Avenatti became a cable television fixture during his representation of Daniels, who was a central figure in the hush-money scandal that resulted in Manhattan federal prosecutors charging Michael Cohen — Trump’s former personal attorney — with campaign finance violations for money he paid to silence women, including Daniels, who claimed affairs with Trump.

Cohen, who pleaded guilty to those and other crimes, was recently released after serving a prison and home-confinement sentence. Trump has denied the alleged affairs.

Avenatti, who cajoled Trump and Cohen over Twitter and appeared side-by-side with Daniels, whose legal name is Stephanie Clifford, in tell-all television interviews, now finds himself behind the defense table squaring off against his former client who helped catapult his celebrity status and career.

If convicted, Avenatti faces a maximum sentence of up to 22 years in prison on charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.

In the case involving Daniels, prosecutors allege that Avenatti — who helped negotiate the $800,000 advance for her September 2018 book “Full Disclosure” — defrauded Daniels by instructing her literary agent to send two of the installments of the advance totaling nearly $300,000 to an account controlled by him, rather than directly to Daniels.

When her agent told Avenatti that she couldn’t do so without Daniels’ authorization, Avenatti sent the agent a letter with a forgery of Daniels’ signature, according to the indictment. Avenatti then lied to Daniels, telling her the publisher hadn’t made the payments, when in reality he used the money to cover payroll costs for his law firm, Eagan Avenatti LLP; a $3,900 lease payment for a Ferrari; and expenses including dry cleaning, airfare, hotels and car services.

In the late months of 2018 and through the beginning of 2019, Daniels repeatedly asked about the missing payments, and Avenatti allegedly continued to lie to her, until Daniels made direct contact with her publisher, and the scheme began to unravel, according to the indictment. She cut off her professional relationship with Avenatti around the time of the indictment.

When Avenatti was charged in May 2019 he tweeted out a response: “No monies relating to Ms. Daniels were ever misappropriated or mishandled. She received millions of dollars worth of legal services and we spent huge sums in expenses. She directly paid only $100.00 for all that she received. I look forward to a jury hearing the evidence.”

Avenatti said again Monday in a statement that he is “completely innocent of these charges. The government is spending millions of dollars to prosecute me for a case that should have never been filed.”

Daniels is expected to be a star witness in the prosecution’s case and could take the stand in Manhattan federal court as early as Tuesday, prosecutors said during a recent hearing.

Potential jurors were asked during jury selection if Daniels’ profession in the pornography industry may make it difficult for them to be fair and impartial. They were also questioned as to their knowledge of the media coverage surrounding Avenatti and his former client.

Judge Jesse Furman ruled over government objections that Avenatti’s counsel can cross examine the adult film star about her “beliefs in the paranormal” and past public statements she’s made about experiencing visions.

“I think that the jury could conclude that that is probative of her ability to accurately perceive events and to her credibility,” Furman said in court.

The defense also subpoenaed Daniels’ current attorney to potentially call him as a witness at the trial. They said they might want to question him about a recorded phone call he made to Avenatti about some of the charges in this case. The attorney, Clark Brewster, has moved to toss that subpoena but the judge has yet to rule on that.

Avenatti’s defense has indicated in court filings “there is a strong likelihood” that the former celebrity lawyer may take the stand in his own defense.

There were preliminary plea deal discussions but a formal deal never materialized, the parties acknowledged during a recent hearing.

Avenatti is now represented by court-appointed federal defenders have running out of funds to retain counsel after years of litigation, according to court filings.

Prosecutors have indicated they will likely rest the government’s case by the end of the week with the entire case expected to wrap in a total of two weeks. Furman said he’d swear in a panel of 12 jurors and six alternates Monday ahead of opening statements.

Years of litigation for alleged scams

In February 2020, Avenatti was convicted in New York of attempting to extort millions of dollars from Nike, by threatening to publicly claim the athletic apparel giant was illicitly paying amateur basketball players. He was sentenced last July to 30 months in prison for which he’s expected to report to a federal prison work camp in Oregon.

A former employee of Avenatti who testified against him during the Nike trial is also expected to testify remotely from California during this trial, prosecutors have indicated.

His report date for that sentence has been pushed pending the outstanding litigation.

Avenatti was released from the now-defunct Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan in April 2020 over Covid-19 concerns amid the rise of the pandemic. He has been in home confinement at a friend’s apartment in California.

He recently filed a formal claim for $94 million in damages against the Bureau of Prisons for his treatment at MCC, where Avenatti alleges he was treated poorly in dire conditions at the order of then-Attorney General William Barr, according to the complaint.
A federal judge granted a mistrial in another case in California in which Avenatti was accused of embezzling nearly $10 million in settlement funds from at least five clients for personal use. The judge granted the motion for mistrial last August on technical grounds, ruling that prosecutors failed to turn financial evidence over to Avenatti’s team. Avenatti appealed the possibility of a retrial and it is unclear if he will be retried in that case.

Avenatti is also facing a second trial in California where he has been charged with tax fraud and bank fraud. He has pleaded not guilty.



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US

Donald Trump Jr. tears into Avenatti, Fauci, Hunter Biden, and CNN in a fiery CPAC Dallas speech

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Donald Trump Jr. took aim at several high-profile targets during a fiery speech at CPAC in Dallas.

Trump Jr. began his unscripted remarks on Friday by touting how his father, former President Donald Trump, was “right” about “everything,” highlighting the coronavirus lab-leak theory that was widely dismissed by Democrats and members of the media last year. 

“At what point in time in these morons’ minds, I don’t know, the Wuhan lab-leak theory not the most plausible argument in the year 2020?” Trump Jr. asked. 

Trump Jr. mocked the lab-leak deniers, sparking laugher in the audience.

DONALD TRUMP JR. SAYS HE’LL BE ‘VERY INVOLVED’ ON 2022 CAMPAIGN TRAIL

“Don’t laugh- you’re not canceled. Congratulations,” Trump Jr. quipped. “By laughing, you would have been thrown off every social media platform, you would have been thrown out of a job in science because, you know, science no longer follows the rules of physics, right? They don’t follow math, they follow the narrative dictated by CNN because that is able to manipulate the rules of physics.”

Trump Jr. lamented that “the world is going to hell” under the Biden administration, pointing to rising gas prices. He knocked the White House’s tweet touting the 16-cent savings from this year’s Fourth of July barbeque. And he took a swipe at White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki for pushing the “narrative” that it was Republicans, not Democrats, who are in favor of “defunding the police.”

“Jen Psaki told me so, so it must be true!” he exclaimed. “Is that true or did you see that on CNN?”

He roasted the media for saying that the “proof” that President Biden “hasn’t lost it” or “riddled with dementia” was by pointing to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s comments calling the president “smart.”

CPAC DALLAS OPENS FRIDAY AS GOP, SQUARELY IN TRUMP’S GRASP, LOOKS TO FUTURE

“I don’t know. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say if it was Donald Trump that Vladimir Putin said that about, it’d be a slightly different response,” Trump Jr. told the crowd. “Did you ever think that maybe Vlad is thrilled to be negotiating against a dolt? 

“America First went down the toilet with this administration folks, okay? But despite what we’re seen going on a daily basis, despite all of that … there’s one silver lining, Michael Avenatti’s going to prison!” he grinned. “I’m sorry… ‘Democratic presidential hopeful.’ I heard this from Brian ‘Potato Head’ Stelter for years on CNN.”

After exchanging pleasantries with an audience member, Trump Jr. shared why he thinks his family is loved by the conservative base.

“We actually fight. We’ll actually push back, right? That’s what Donald Trump did for the Republican Party. He showed that you don’t have to just turn the other cheek, roll over and die as the other side gets what they want and laughs their way to the bank,” he explained. “We need you guys in that fight with us… They can’t cancel all of us.” 

Trump Jr. slammed the “propagandists” in the media for “jumping on every conspiracy.”

“Remember, you guys get canceled for being conspiracy theorists. They created them, they push them, and yet there’s no accountability,” he told the audience. “But today, in 2021, we all know that the difference between a conspiracy theory and the truth is about six months.”

CPAC 2021: FOX NATION TO SPONSOR, STREAM LIVE SPEECHES FROM INFLUENTIAL CONSERVATIVES

Trump Jr. then took aim at White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci, calling him a “bureaucrat in a lab coat.”

“Fauci is better at pitching baseballs than he is at science, okay?” Trump Jr. jabbed the NIAID director, a reference to Fauci’s disastrous Opening Day first pitch attempt.

He pummeled Hunter Biden for his racist text messages that have surfaced from his “laptop from Hell,” as well as the newly-launched art show of his paintings, which has been sounding alarms over ethics concerns. 

“How do we get what we want from the Democrat Party? Just buy Hunter’s art,” Trump Jr. knocked the president’s son. “What do you think the media reaction would be to ‘Don Jr. smoking parmesan cheese?’ I promise you it wouldn’t be what we saw from the media. It would be a little different. And then I say that and they say ‘Oh, you’re making fun of people with addiction’ … I totally understand addiction. It’s terrible. We all know people that have suffered from it. It doesn’t absolve you from being a total piece of garbage in every other aspect of your life. It doesn’t absolve you from selling access to the highest levels of government. It doesn’t absolve you from selling out your country. It doesn’t absolve you from, I don’t know, child support from the stripper you knocked up a couple of years ago… Because I have a feeling that if it was me, I would not be absolved.”

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Trump Jr. later railed against Hunter Biden’s father and his love for ice cream. 

“Has Joe Biden done anything that didn’t involve an ice cream parlor?” Trump Jr. asked. “It’s like a toddler. Like, ‘Joe, if you get the line right, you get a scoop of ice cream! Maybe even two scoops!’”

He closed his remarks with a pep talk with the pro-Trump crowd. 

“Stay in the fight. Stay in the game. Make sure you’re involved. Make sure you have those conversations with your friends. Don’t let this one slide,” said Trump Jr. “We need you in there with us… We will continue to be in this fight as long as you guys do.”

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