Michael Avenatti, the attorney known for his conflict with former President Donald Trump, was ordered Friday to pay his client, Stormy Daniels, nearly $150,000.
The court ordered that Avenatti pay $148,750 in restitution to Daniels after a Manhattan federal jury convicted Avenatti of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in February for misappropriating $297,500 of book revenue for Daniels’ book, “Full Disclosure,” Reuters reported. The court later sentenced him to 48 months in prison, the Justice Department previously announced.
The sentence required him to repay his client the sum of the money, though the restitution is slightly smaller since he repaid some of the money, Reuters reported.
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is known for allegedly being paid $130,000 by Trump fixer Michael Cohen in the 2016 election in exchange for keeping quiet about an alleged affair she claimed to have had with the former president in 2006, according to Reuters. Trump denied the allegation and sued Daniels for defamation, in which a judge ruled that she pay him nearly $300,000.
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The disbarred attorney represented Daniels in 2018 when she attempted to free herself from the nondisclosure agreement requiring her to remain quiet about the alleged affair. While representing her, Avenatti directed her literary agent to send large sums of money from her book deal to be transferred to a bank account controlled by him, the Justice Department said in the announcement. (RELATED: Avenatti Charged With Defrauding Stormy Daniels)
He reportedly sent the literary agent a fraudulent letter in which he disguised himself as Daniels which instructed that the money be located to his account, the Justice Department added. The document was sent without her consent and appeared “to bear her signature.” He then received an installment of $148,750 which he used for his own personal use. He is now required to pay this sum back to Daniels.
Before the trial regarding these charges, Avenatti was already serving a two-and-a-half year sentence for trying to extort millions of dollars from Nike Inc. The court also ordered to pay $259,800.50 to the company, according to Reuters.