Federal prosecutors painted disgraced attorney Michael Avenatti as a serial liar and calculating thief who stole nearly $300,000 from his client, Stormy Daniels, as his criminal trial in Manhattan kicked off Monday.
“This case is about a lawyer who stole from his client, a lawyer who lied to cover up for the scheme. That lawyer is the defendant, Michael Avenatti,” Assistant US Attorney Andrew Rohrbach told jurors in his opening statement.
Rohrbach accused Avenatti of hatching a plan to siphon hundreds of thousands of dollars in book advance money from Daniels.
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, inked a book deal in 2018 after it emerged that she was paid $130,000 in hush money to keep quiet about her alleged affair with President Donald Trump.
The book’s publisher agreed to pay Daniels $800,000 in four installments for the book — but two of those payments were swiped by Avenatti, Rohrbach alleged.
The embattled lawyer forged Daniels’ signature on a letter to her literary agent, requesting the advance payments be deposited in a bank account he controlled, Rohrbach added.
The fake letter worked, the feds allege, and two of the payments — totaling nearly $300,000 — were deposited into the account and spent by Avenatti.
Avenatti lied to Daniels when she asked him about the missing funds, Rohrbach said.
“He lied. He told her the publisher was being slow. Told her he was working on it. [But] he had her money and he was spending it,” he said.
Avenatti blew through the cash on day-to-day expenses such as payroll for his law firm, but also used some of the funds on travel, food, dry cleaning and a lease payment for a Ferrari, according to the indictment against him.
The loudmouthed lawyer, who was previously convicted in the same court for trying to shake down Nike for millions of dollars, has steadfastly denied the claims.
Defense attorney Andrew Dalack said in his opening statement that the case is merely a money dispute between a lawyer and his client, which never should have been prosecuted.
“Mr. Avenatti was authorized to accept money on Ms. Daniels’ behalf,” Dalack said, adding that she had requested Avenatti hide money from her estranged husband.
In a statement Sunday, Avenatti said he should’ve never been criminally charged.
“I am completely innocent of these charges. The government is spending millions of dollars to prosecute me for a case that should have never been filed,” he said.
Avenatti is charged with one count of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft for the alleged scheme. He faces a maximum sentence of 22 years in prison if convicted on both counts.
Avenatti and Daniels rose to national fame during the Trump administration over the hush-money scandal, which also involved former Trump fixer-turned-convict Michael Cohen.
Trump denies ever having sex with Daniels, who is expected to testify at the trial.
Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer who went to federal prison after pleading guilty in 2018 to tax evasion, bank fraud and lying to Congress about Trump dealings with Russia, sat in the courtroom for Avenatti’s opening statements Monday morning.
“I think Michael Avenatti has shown himself to be the dirtbag everybody expected him to be,” Cohen told reporters outside of the courthouse.
