What Happened To Stormy Daniels' Former Lawyer, Michael Avenatti?
After representing Stormy Daniels in the infamous Donald Trump case, Michael Avenatti had a precipitous fall from grace — to put it mildly. Avenatti rose to prominence when he represented Daniels in the case where she claimed to have been paid $130,000 in hush money following her affair with Trump. The lawyer was making headlines and feeding the press quotes. His star shined so bright that, by April 2018, multiple talent agencies had contacted him about cashing in on his public exposure. Shortly after, the good times came to a screeching halt.
Avenatti was arrested in November 2018 on suspicion of domestic violence. Although he vehemently denied the accusations at the time. That was only the beginning of his legal troubles. A few months later, in March 2019, Avenatti was arrested again, this time for attempting to extort $25 million from Nike. Allegedly, he threatened to expose the brand for sending money to the families of high school athletes, unless they paid him an exhorbitant sum. The attorney sought the funds to help support his lavish lifestyle, as fame had apparently gone to his head.
In July 2021, Avenatti was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for his Nike extortion scheme. The judge claimed the lawyer "had become drunk on the power of his platform," per ESPN. "Your honor, I've learned that all the fame, notoriety and money in the world is meaningless," Avenatti said. The disgraced lawyer's downfall only worsened from there.
Michael Avenatti stole from Stormy Daniels
While serving his sentence for attempting to extort Nike, Michael Avenatti was convicted in February 2022 of stealing $300,000 from former client Stormy Daniels. Daniels had been paid $800,000 for a tell-all book, and while acting as her lawyer, Avenatti intercepted the funds and pocketed $300,000. He was convicted of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, and faced 20 years in prison. Fortunately for Avenatti, he avoided a lengthy sentence and was given four years in prison in June 2022, which amounted to him serving an additional two and a half years behind bars after his Nike sentence. "I have destroyed my career, my relationships and my reputation and have done collateral damage to my family and my life," Avenatti said at the time, per CNN.
A peculiar detail of the Daniels fraud case was that Avenatti decided to represent himself in court. "He fires his defense team so he can cross-examine me himself," the former adult film star recalled to VladTV in June 2022. "And that went on for five and a half hours where he basically tried everything to discredit me," Daniels added. Part of Avenatti's court strategy in the fraud case was to prove that Daniels was "crazy." He even had her prescription medication history submitted as evidence, but the "Full Disclosure" author had never been on any serious medication, and his strategy proved baseless.
Not long after, it was revealed that Avenatti had defrauded multiple clients, which led to him being given major jail time.
Why Michael Avenatti was so upset with Stormy Daniels
Once Michael Avenatti was busted for stealing from Stormy Daniels, she started to open up about his unusual behavior. While serving as her lawyer in the Donald Trump case, Avenatti believed he could leverage his newfound fame into a political career, but Daniels was unsupportive. "The real turning point is how mad he got when I flat out refused to endorse him for president," she told News Nation in February 2022. Daniels also said she was unfazed by the prospect of being cross-examined by her former attorney in her fraud case against him. "He doesn't scare me," she told News Nation. "I've seen Donald Trump naked. Nothing Michael Avenatti can say will scare me."
It turned out that Daniels was only one of the clients who Avenatti had stolen from. After being sentenced to five years in prison for attempting to extort Nike, and defrauding Daniels, the former lawyer was sentenced to 14 years in prison when it was revealed he had embezzled settlement money from multiple clients. His theft included stealing "$4 million from a client with major disabilities," per CNN. "He stole millions of dollars from his clients — all to finance his extravagant lifestyle that included a private jet and race cars," US attorney Martin Estrade said in a statement at the time.
Needless to say, no talent agencies came calling after Avenatti made headlines that time around.