In a drastic escalation of the criminal case against Michael Avenatti, the brash lawyer known for representing Stormy Daniels in lawsuits against President Trump, federal prosecutors in California announced on Thursday that he had been indicted on three dozen counts. The authorities accused Mr. Avenatti of stealing millions of dollars from five clients and of lying repeatedly about his business and income — not just to clients but also to an Internal Revenue Service collection agent, creditors, a bankruptcy court and a bankruptcy trustee. Mr. Avenatti was indicted by a grand jury in Santa Ana, Calif., on the new charges, which included tax fraud and bankruptcy fraud, adding to charges of wire fraud, bank fraud and extortion that were filed against him last month in New York and California. “It is lawyer 101: You do not steal your client’s money,” Nicola T. Hanna, the United States attorney in Los Angeles, said at a news conference Thursday, describing Mr. Avenatti’s business as a Ponzi scheme of sorts. “Money generated from one set of crimes was used to further other crimes, typically in the form of payments used to string along victims so as to prevent Mr. Avenatti’s financial house of cards from collapsing.”

Source: New York Times April 11, 2019 15:15 UTC