Lawyer carnival barker Michael Avenatti has gone to court to file an attorney’s lien, demanding the USD$450,000 settlement received by former client Stormy Daniels in her lawsuit against the Columbus, Ohio police department.
Avenatti, 48, who represented the fading porn star in her ill-conceived court actions against President Donald Trump and Trump’s former fixer, Michael Cohen, filed the lien in the United States District Court in the Southern District of Ohio, Wednesday. The embattled mouthpiece claims Daniels owes him over USD$2,000,000 “in legal fees and costs she has enjoyed for her benefit over the last approximate 19 months, including in this case. . . .”
The Daily Beast broke the story Thursday [how far the mighty have fallen that this story went to the friggin’ Daily Beast instead of The Washgington Post!], reporting that Avenatti “claims the porn star refuses to pay up because she is a ‘celebrity,’ and is therefore ‘entitled to free legal services and costs’ and to ‘manufacture and fabricate facts designed to impugn the reputation of her counsel and falsely accuse him of a multitude of acts.'”
“But the law does not work that way Ms. Daniels wishes,” the court filing continues.
The wrinkle here, of course, is that Avenatti has claimed previously that money raised from Stormy’s “legal fund” would go to cover the costs associated with representing Daniels.
So it appears as though we have a case where a lawyer is reneging on his deal with a client who had reneged on her deal with Trump and Cohen.
Boy oh boy do Stormy and Avenatti deserve each other.
Here is a full copy of the lien, along with Exhibit A from Avenatti’s filing — his letter purporting to terminate his legal services back in February.
According to Daniels, however, after she and Avenatti had a falling out, Daniels fired him and hired Oklahoma litigator Clark Brewster to represent her.
Give me the money
Daniel was arrested in July 2018 during a live performance at a strip club in Columbus, Ohio. Daniels with her then-attorney Michael Avenatti quickly charged that the arrest was politically motivated due to her lawsuit against Trump, as AVN.com reported.
As AVN’s Michael French wrote on Sept 27:
Daniels then sued the Columbus police, claiming that she was wrongfully arrested due to the political, pro-Trump biases of the arresting officers.
On Friday morning, Daniels returned to Columbus to negotiate a settlement to the $2 million lawsuit. The negotiations did not last long. According to a report by WSYX/WTTE TV News, shortly before noon local time, Daniels announced that she had settled the lawsuit for $450,000—less than 25 percent of the sum she originally demanded.
