LOS ANGELES (CNS) – Deliberations are expected to resume Tuesday in the Los Angeles federal criminal trial of once-high-powered litigator Tom Girardi, who is accused of running a massive 10-year Ponzi scheme in which he allegedly siphoned at least $15 million in settlement funds from his clients.
During closing arguments Monday, a federal prosecutor urged the jury to find the defendant guilty of four counts of wire fraud for stealing from injured clients and spending the money on private jets, golf club memberships, jewelry and the career of his now-estranged wife, “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” star Erika Jayne.
“He wanted the outside world to believe he was fighting for people who couldn’t help themselves,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Ali Moghaddas told the jury, adding that clients expecting settlement funds waited as “days turned into months and months turned into years.”
Girardi, 85, who suffers from dementia but was deemed able to assist in his own defense, sat with his lawyers, taking notes and rarely looking at the prosecutor as closing arguments were delivered.
Charles Snyder, a deputy federal public defender who is representing Girardi, argued that as his client’s cognitive impairment worsened, employees of the defendant’s now-closed Girardi Keese law firm were stealing funds “hand over fist.”
“Girardi was not paying close attention” to the operation of his firm, Snyder said, saying his client “got old, got sick, and lost his mind.”
The jury deliberated for a few hours Monday afternoon before leaving for the day on the 12th day of trial. Deliberations are set to resume Tuesday morning.
On Thursday, Girardi was the final witness called by his lawyers to testify, claiming “every client got every penny that every client was supposed to get.”
The defendant blamed his firm’s former chief accountant, Chris Kamon, for missing money. From the witness stand, Girardi said Kamon “was pretty clever in stealing millions of dollars.”
Kamon, 50, is scheduled to stand trial separately in January on wire fraud charges, accused of pocketing about $50 million from Girardi Keese settlement accounts.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Paetty told jurors in his rebuttal argument that Kamon will soon face his day in court. At the same time, just because the former accountant allegedly siphoned settlement funds, that doesn’t make Girardi innocent.
“It just makes Girardi Keese a den of thieves, and it makes Girardi the thief-in-chief,” Paetty said.
Snyder told the jury in L.A. federal court in his closing that while Girardi became an increasingly confused “bad manager” of the firm, Kamon was operating as a “virtuoso” of fraud.
However, Moghaddas said it was Girardi who treated attorney-client trust accounts as “his personal piggy bank,” adding that some clients never saw anything of their settlements.
Prosecutors allege the scheme lasted from 2010 to 2020.
The four wire fraud counts correspond to four victims whose settlement funds were allegedly pilfered by the disgraced ex-attorney.
Joe Ruigomez suffered burns on most of his body when a gas line exploded, killing his girlfriend. Judy Selberg’s husband was killed in a boating calamity. Josefina Hernandez was injured by a faulty medical device. Erika Saldana’s one-year old baby was badly injured in a car crash with a drunk driver. The baby later died. Hernandez was owed $17.5 million.
Earlier this year, after several days of hearings, Girardi was found competent to stand trial despite his claim that he has Alzheimer’s disease and is incapable of assisting his lawyers. He is free on $250,000 bond and lives in the secure memory ward of an Orange County nursing home.
Once known as a defender of the powerless in class-action lawsuits against corporations, Girardi represented plaintiffs in a number of high- profile cases, including Bryan Stow’s civil suit against Major League Baseball. Stow was the San Francisco Giants fan who sustained severe injuries during an attack in a Dodger Stadium parking lot.
Girardi also represented plaintiffs in the toxic groundwater case against Pacific Gas & Electric Co. that was dramatized in the Oscar-winning 2000 Julia Roberts movie “Erin Brockovich.”
Jayne filed for divorce from Girardi in 2020 after a 21-year marriage. Following the split, the couple listed their Pasadena home for sale at a price of $13 million. Jayne has not been charged in the case against her husband.
After Girardi was disbarred in 2022, the State Bar of California reported it had received 205 complaints against him alleging he misappropriated settlement money, abandoned clients or committed other serious ethical violations over the course of his four-decade career.
Girardi Keese collapsed in late 2020 after Girardi was accused in a Chicago lawsuit of embezzling money meant for clients the firm was representing in litigation over an airplane crash in Indonesia. The lawsuit brought by plaintiffs’ firm Edelson PC has since been transferred to Los Angeles.
Girardi is in Chapter 7 bankruptcy proceedings, as is the now- shuttered Wilshire Boulevard law firm that bore his name and that faces more than $500 million in claims.
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