BREAKING: Avenatti Arrested And Charged With Trying to Extort $20 Million From Nike
Michael Avenatti, the attorney who rose to fame with his former representation of Stormy Daniels, has been arrested and is being charged with extortion over allegations that he tried to extract more than $20 million from Nike.
Federal prosecutors with the South District of New York (SDNY) have announced that they are criminally charging Avenatti over an alleged plot where he threatened Nike by promising that he had damaging information about the company, and he’d go public with it unless the athletic apparel company agreed to give him and a client millions of dollars. The news comes an hour after Avenatti had this to say on Twitter:
Tmrw at 11 am ET, we will be holding a press conference to disclose a major high school/college basketball scandal perpetrated by @Nike that we have uncovered. This criminal conduct reaches the highest levels of Nike and involves some of the biggest names in college basketball.
— Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) March 25, 2019
The SDNY announced that they will hold a press conference at 2:30 p.m. today to elaborate on the charges.
On a separate but related note, CNBC reports that Avenatti is also facing bank and wire fraud charges in Los Angeles due to allegations that he embezzled money from a client to pay off his own debts. This comes amid the recent news that Avenatti tried to declare bankruptcy on his former law firm after giving up control to a court-ordered receiver and did not ask for their permission.
This story is developing and we shall update accordingly.
Watch above, via CNN and NBC.
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