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Attorney Michael Avenatti, who rose to fame representing porn star Stormy Daniels in her lawsuit against former President Donald Trump, has been sentenced to 14 years in federal prison for evading taxes and stealing millions of dollars from clients.
In an Orange County district court Monday, Avenatti, 51, was also ordered to pay nearly $8 million in restitution after admitting he secretly used settlement money paid to his clients to buy a private plane, which will now be impounded.
Judge James V. Selna said Avenatti’s sentence will run consecutively to, or in addition to, the five years he is already serving in sentences in New York for an extortion scheme against Nike and for stealing from Daniels.
Federal prosecutors in Santa Ana had asked Selna to impose a 17 1/2-year term, while Avenatti argued for just six years. Avenatti also argued, unsuccessfully, that his new sentence goes along with the punishment he is already serving for the New York cases.
Prosecutors also accused Avenatti of defrauding his clients out of $12 million, one of whom was a paraplegic with a mentally ill disability. He argued that the actual amount his clients lost was closer to $3.8 million.
The lawyer represented himself at trial, despite the fact that he had lost his law license, and wrote about himself in the third person.
“The defendant deserves just punishment for his crimes, including a prison sentence,” Avenatti wrote in a memo to the judge.
“He also deserves to lose his law license, his 22-year career, his estate, his countless personal and professional relationships, and his reputation, almost all of which have already been rightfully taken from him,” he continued.
Avenatti was also ordered to pay nearly $8 million to former clients whose settlement money he had stolen.
Avenatti’s disabled client, Geoffrey Ernest Johnson, wrote in a court statement that the experience had left him heartbroken and unable to trust people.
“To this day, I don’t know why Michael lied and cheated on me, why he broke my trust, why he broke my heart,” Johnson wrote.
Avenatti pleaded guilty earlier this year to four counts of wire fraud and one tax-related charge without reaching a plea agreement with federal prosecutors. He told the court that he wanted to be responsible and spare his family any more embarrassment of him.
Before sentencing, Avenatti apologized to the four victims in the case, three of whom were in the courtroom.
“I am deeply sorry and contrite,” Avenatti said. “There is no doubt that they all deserve much better, and I hope that one day they will accept my apology and find it in their hearts to forgive me.”
Prosecutor Brett Sagel told the court that Avenatti’s criminal conduct “stemmed from calculated choices and egregious breaches of trust” placed in him by his clients.
“He did not resort to his criminal actions out of desperation, out of necessity, out of an inability to do otherwise,” Sagel said. “Despite the significant advantages this defendant had (a first-rate education, a prosperous legal career), he chose to commit the deplorable acts in this case over and over again.”
Michael Avenatti (right) pictured with Stormy Daniels (left) in January 2019. He also took money from her book proceeds, which contributed to her current five-year sentence.
Attorney Michael Avenatti, who rose to fame representing porn star Stormy Daniels in her lawsuit against former President Donald Trump, was sentenced today in Orange County to 14 years in federal prison for tax evasion and stealing millions of dollars from customers.
The government dropped all other remaining charges against Avenatti stemming from a 36-count indictment.
Avenatti is currently serving time in a Southern California prison in two separate cases. In one he was found guilty of stealing the proceeds from Daniels’ book and in the other of attempting to extort $25 million from Nike.
Avenatti represented Daniels in his lawsuit to break a confidentiality agreement with Trump to keep quiet about an affair he said they were having and became one of Trump’s main adversaries, attacking him on cable news shows and Twitter.
In California, prosecutors said Avenatti collected $4 million from Los Angeles County for a man who sustained injuries in custody and became a paraplegic after a suicide attempt, but denied the settlement was received and paid the man amounts smaller than they range from $1,000 to $1,900 which he called advances on the broader settlement. In another case, prosecutors said Avenatti collected a $2.75 million settlement payment for a client and used much of the money to buy a private jet.
Prosecutors had asked that Avenatti be sentenced to an additional 17.5 years in prison on top of the five he is already serving.
Avenatti, who represented himself in the process, requested that he be sentenced to no more than six years that would run concurrently with the time he is serving.