By David Thomas
(Reuters) – Federal prosecutors in Chicago and Los Angeles on Wednesday filed criminal charges against disbarred California attorney Tom Girardi, accusing him of taking more than $18 million in funds belonging to his clients.
Prosecutors in Los Angeles charged Girardi, 83, with five counts of wire fraud for allegedly embezzling $15 million from 2010 to 2020, while prosecutors in Chicago charged him with eight counts of wire fraud and four counts of criminal contempt of court.
Chicago prosecutors alleged that Girardi misappropriated more than $3 million in client funds owed to families of the victims of the 2018 Boeing 737 MAX Lion Air Flight 610 crash in Indonesia. The crash killed all 189 onboard.
In the Los Angeles case, prosecutors alleged that Girardi took money from clients who were injured in car crashes, including one family whose child was paralyzed in the crash.
Christopher Kamon, the former chief financial officer of Girardi’s now-defunct law firm Girardi Keese, was also charged in the Chicago and Los Angeles cases.
“They were committing fraud on a massive scale,” Martin Estrada, the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, said during a Wednesday news conference.
Girardi’s son-in-law, David Lira, who also worked at the firm, was also charged with wire fraud and criminal contempt of court by the Chicago prosecutors.
Girardi’s legal and personal affairs are now handled by his brother Robert, a dentist. Robert Girardi has asserted that his brother is mentally incompetent, and a psychiatrist said he has Alzheimer’s disease.
Robert Girardi did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. Attorneys for Lira and Kamon also were not immediately available on the charges.
Girardi and his wife, “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” star Erika Jayne Girardi, were sued in 2020 in federal court in Chicago by another law firm in the Lion Air case that alleged they misused client funds. Erika Jayne Girardi denied the claims.
The California Supreme Court disbarred Girardi in June in connection with his alleged conduct in the Lion Air case. Girardi never formally responded to the state bar’s disciplinary charges.
Kamon was separately charged with wire fraud in November for allegedly embezzling $10 million from the defunct Girardi Keese firm. He has pleaded not guilty.
(Reporting by David Thomas; additional reporting by David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by David Bario and Jonathan Oatis)
