The rise and fall of Michael Avenatti, the former high-profile lawyer best known for representing Stormy Daniels in her suit against Trump, now serving a 20-year prison term

Avenatti graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1996. Three years later, he received his JD degree from George Washington University.

During college and law school, Avenatti worked for The Research Group, a campaign research firm founded by Rahm Emmanuel, former President Barack Obama's chief of staff and the current Democratic mayor of Chicago.

Source: Chicago Magazine

After graduating law school, Avenatti worked at O'Melveny & Myers, a high-powered Los Angeles law firm. Over the course of his legal career, he contributed to several high-profile cases involving Paris Hilton, Jim Carrey, and members of the rock band The Eagles.

At O'Melveny & Myers, Avenatti worked with Dan Petrocelli, the attorney who represented the family that sued OJ Simpson for murder. Simpson was found not guilty in 1995.

Sources: Avenatti, Business Insider

In 2007, he formed his own firm called Eagan Avenatti, where he has settled and won lucrative cases against the NFL and medical manufacturers Kimberly-Clark and Halyard Health, among others.

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Avenatti is also an auto-racing fanatic. He has participated in numerous races around the US and in Europe. "Life is meant to be lived; there are no dress rehearsals," he told GW Law School magazine in 2010.

Source: GW Law School

One of Avenatti's former law school professors witnessed his ambition up close. "He is an adrenaline junkie," Jonathan Turley, who taught Avenatti at GW Law, told The Washington Post. "I think he needs that adrenaline rush. He lives his life aggressively. In both litigation and in life he shows a certain aggressive style."

Source: The Washington Post

In 2013, Avenatti bought Tully's Coffee, a Seattle-based coffee franchise that had just gone bankrupt. By 2018, as Avenatti gained prominence in the national media for his role in the Stormy Daniels case, a spokesman for Tully's said he no longer owned the company, but still served as its general counsel. Tully's later went out of business.

Before representing Daniels, Avenatti was a thorn in Trump's side for years. While working at Greene Broillet & Wheeler, a law firm in California, Avenatti helped sue Trump for allegedly stealing the idea of his hit reality TV show on NBC, "The Apprentice."

Rob Kim/Getty Images

Source: The Washington Post

In 2018, Avenatti took the case of adult film actress Stormy Daniels, who sued then-President Donald Trump. Daniels alleged she and Trump had an affair that she had been threatened to keep quiet about, and Trump's longtime fixer, Michael Cohen, paid Daniels $130,000 days before the 2016 presidential election for her silence. After Trump called the allegations "a total con job," Daniels sued for defamation.

As an attorney, Avenatti was quite theatrical, with regular TV appearances featuring press-grabbing stunts like releasing video of Daniels taking a polygraph test. During an exchange on CNN, Avenatti excoriated Cohen, then Trump's personal attorney, repeatedly calling him a "thug." In another appearance, Avenatti offered a $100,000 reward for identifying the man Daniels claimed intimidated her into silence about her alleged affair with Trump.

Source: CNN

Daniels' case was ultimately dismissed on first amendment grounds, with the judge ordering Daniels to pay Trump's legal fees.

Sources: Business Insider, Business Insider

In a report titled "Project Sunlight" released May 8, 2018 Avenatti alleged that Cohen received $500,000 from a Russian oligarch shortly after the 2016 election, and claims that money may have served as a reimbursement for the payment to Daniels.

Source: Business Insider

Later that year, Cohen pled guilty to eight federal crimes, including campaign finance violations related to the payout to Daniels. He was sentenced to three years in prison and was released in 2021.

In March 2019, Daniels ended her professional relationship with Avenatti. When federal prosecutors announced charges against the lawyer later that month for an extortion scheme against Nike, Daniels told CNBC she was "saddened but not shocked regarding his arrest."

Source: Business Insider

Legal troubles mounted for Avenatti in 2019: In April, he was accused of embezzling more than $3 million from a client with paraplegia and using the money to fund his coffee business and race-car team. Daniels also filed suit, accusing him of stealing $300,000 of book-deal proceeds from her.

In July 2021, Avenatti was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison after being found guilty of extortion, transmission of interstate communications with intent to extort, and wire fraud in the Nike case.

Source: Business Insider

Daniels also prevailed in her lawsuit in February 2022, when a jury convicted Avenatti of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft related to her case. In June, he was sentenced to an additional 4 years in prison.

"I will forever be branded a disgraced lawyer," Avenatti said after his conviction related to the Daniels case. "There is serious doubt as to how or if I will ever recover any semblance of a normal life or peace."

On December 5, Avenatti was sentenced to a further 14 years in prison and ordered to pay more than $10 million in restitution after pleading guilty to four counts of wire fraud related to the allegations of embezzling money from clients. He faced a potential sentence of 83 years for embezzling millions of dollars from four different people.

Avenatti's 14-year sentence will begin after he completes the 2 1/2 and 4-year sentences from his other convictions he is currently serving. "I dreamed about becoming a lawyer," Avenatti said in court after the Nike extortion conviction. "About doing good, and about pursuing and achieving justice. For years I did just that, but then I lost my way. I betrayed my own values, my friends, my family and myself."