A prosecutor has told jurors in closing arguments that lawyer Michael Avenatti told repeated lies to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2018 to hide his theft of her book proceeds.
Assistant US attorney Robert Sobelman instructed the Manhattan federal jury to follow a trail of text messages, bank statements and lies by Avenatti to reach its verdict on charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
“They travelled and appeared on television together. He was supposed to be her advocate. But the defendant betrayed her trust,” Mr Sobelman said.
“He stole from her and lied to her over and over and over again.”
The prosecutor referred to evidence from Daniels about communicating with dead people and unusual experiences she faced when she lived in a New Orleans home, saying Avenatti was trying to portray her as crazy.
“Does she have some unusual experiences? Yes. Some unusual beliefs? Sure. But everything she told you is backed up by the documents and the text messages,” Mr Sobelman said.
Prosecutors say Avenatti pocketed nearly 300,000 dollars in 2018 by using a fake document to make it appear that Daniels approved of her book proceeds going into a bank account Avenatti controlled.
They say he did that even though his contract with Daniels called for him to receive only 100 dollars for his work on her behalf.
Avenatti, representing himself, said he never committed a crime.
He insists he had permission from Daniels to pocket some of the 800,000-dollar advance on her autobiography, Full Disclosure. Daniels told the court he did not.
In his own closing argument, Avenatti told jurors that he and his firm had spent millions of dollars “to the benefit of Ms Daniels”.
He said that if they conclude that he had a good faith belief in his mind that he was entitled to be paid from book proceeds, the jurors must acquit.
“A good faith belief, ladies and gentlemen, is a complete defence to all of these charges. It’s game over for the government,” he said.
“Let me be clear, Michael Avenatti never committed the crime of wire fraud. Michael Avenatti never committed the crime of aggravated identity theft. There is insufficient evidence, ladies and gentlemen, to show that Michael Avenatti, ever intended to defraud Ms Daniels.”
He accused her of lying when she gave evidence for two days last week and called her “not credible”, citing her claim that she has a doll that called her “mommy”, that she sees dead people and can see inside a house from the outside.
“Is that somebody you can count on 100% when determining whether someone committed a crime beyond a reasonable doubt?” Avenatti asked. “I would submit no.”
Daniels and Avenatti were a team in 2018 as he represented her in lawsuits against former president Donald Trump. She hired him in her bid to speak publicly about claims of a tryst with Mr Trump a decade earlier despite being paid 130,000 dollars shortly before the 2016 presidential election to remain silent.
While representing Daniels, Avenatti appeared frequently as a guest on television cable news programmes and grew in popularity to the point where he considered running for president himself in 2020.
But then he was charged in New York in early 2019 with trying to extort up to 25 million dollars from Nike with threats that he would otherwise spoil the firm’s reputation. He was charged the same day in Los Angeles with ripping off clients for millions of dollars.
Weeks later, he was charged with stealing from Daniels. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Avenatti, 50, has already been sentenced to two and a half years in prison in the Nike case. The Los Angeles case resulted in a mistrial last year as Avenatti represented himself.
