Lawyer Michael Avenatti was found guilty on Friday of defrauding his former client, Stormy Daniels.
The pornographic actress, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, accused Avenatti in the New York case of stealing nearly $300,000 out of the $800,000 advance on her book deal for her autobiography, Full Disclosure, and misled her about what he did with the money.
Avenatti, who pleaded not guilty and was given permission to represent himself in court, faces up to 22 years in prison for his conviction on wire fraud and aggravated identity theft charges. The jurors agreed with accusations that he used a bogus letter to trick Daniels’s literary agent into sending him almost $300,000 in publisher’s payments intended for her, according to the New York Times.
Avenatti “stole from me and lied to me,” Daniels told jurors Jan. 27.
ANOTHER LOOK AT MICHAEL AVENATTI AND HIS MEDIA ENABLERS
Avenatti, 50, rose to national acclaim in 2018 after he represented Daniels in multiple lawsuits against former President Donald Trump. The lawsuits claimed that the Trump administration paid Daniels $130,000 in 2016 to keep quiet about an affair she had with Trump 10 years before he ran for office. Trump denies the accusations.
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Avenatti is facing other criminal cases. He was arrested and jailed in January 2020 and has been in home confinement in California since April of that year.
Avenatti was found guilty in 2020 of attempting to extort Nike for up to $25 million and was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison. He has not started the prison sentence yet. Avenatti represented himself for six weeks in an embezzlement case, which resulted in a mistrial, last year after clients alleged he cheated them out of millions of dollars. Avenatti is awaiting a retrial.
