Michael Avenatti may spend less time in prison after appeals court decision

By Jonathan Stempel

(Reuters) - Michael Avenatti, the disgraced celebrity lawyer who represented porn actress Stormy Daniels, will have his 14-year prison term for defrauding four other clients recalculated, following a federal appeals court decision on Wednesday that could shorten his sentence.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena, California said the trial judge who sentenced Avenatti erred by applying an obstruction of justice enhancement, and not accounting for the value of Avenatti's legal services to his clients and the money he paid them.

Avenatti, 53, has been serving a combined 19-year prison term, including five years for his 2020 and 2022 convictions in New York for trying to extort $25 million from Nike and defrauding Daniels out of proceeds from her memoir.

Before being charged, Avenatti became famous representing Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, in litigation against Donald Trump, and becoming a vocal adversary on cable TV and Twitter of the former U.S. president.

In Wednesday's decision, the three-judge appeals court panel gave an additional potential ground for a shorter sentence.

It said the trial judge should have viewed Daniels' case and the other fraud cases as similar, when deciding if Avenatti's five-year sentence and the new sentence should run concurrently.

Prosecutors said Avenatti defrauded the four additional clients out of millions of dollars.

Margaret Farrand, a federal public defender representing Avenatti, said in an email: "I am glad that the Ninth Circuit recognized the errors that wrongly increased Mr. Avenatti's sentence."

The office of U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada in Los Angeles did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Avenatti will be resentenced by U.S. District Judge James Selna in Santa Ana, California.

Selna imposed the 14-year term in December 2022 after Avenatti pleaded guilty to wire fraud and obstruction charges. A conviction at trial could have sent him to prison for life.

Avenatti's legal career collapsed in March 2019, when he was charged in the Nike case. The federal appeals court in Manhattan rejected his appeals in that case and the Daniels case.

The case is U.S. v. Avenatti, 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 22-50301.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Bill Berkrot)