Michael Avenatti indicted on charges of ripping off porn star Stormy Daniels, trying to extort Nike

Controversial lawyer Michael Avenatti was indicted Wednesday in separate cases charging him with stealing about $300,000 from his former porn star client Stormy Daniels, and with trying to extort athletic shoe giant Nike out of tens of millions of dollars by threatening to go public with claims the company was facilitating payments to the families of high school basketball stars.

While the Nike-related indictment was expected because it mirrors allegations in a criminal complaint executed against Avenatti in March, the claims related to Daniels were brand new.

Avenatti, who last year was mulling a run for the White House, is now charged in three separate federal indictments, including one pending in California related to alleged theft of client funds and other crimes, and faces the possibility of many years in prison if convicted.

According to one of the new indictments in New York, Avenatti allegedly forged Daniels’ signature on a document that gave wire fund transfer information to her literary agent, which helped direct the money paid out for the book sales to a bank account controlled by Avenatt.

The lawyer had become widely known and notorious last year for his representation of Daniels, who was paid $140,000 on the eve of the 2016 presidential election by President Donald Trump’s then-personal lawyer Michael Cohen to keep her quiet about her alleged  sexual tryst with Trump a decade earlier. Trump denies having sex with her.

Prosecutors claim that Avenatti ripped off Daniels by taking payments for her book sales and paying her just half of what she was owed.

The indictment, which charges him with wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, accuses him of spending some of the money he allegedly swindled from Daniels on a lease payment for his Ferrari, travel expenses, dry cleaning and $56,000 in payroll at his law firm.

“Michael Avenatti abused and violated the core duty of an attorney – the duty to his client,” said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman.

“As alleged, he used his position of trust to steal an advance on the client’s book deal. As alleged, he blatantly lied to and stole from his client to maintain his extravagant lifestyle, including to pay for, among other things, a monthly car payment on a Ferrari. Far from zealously representing his client, Avenatti, as alleged, instead engaged in outright deception and theft, victimizing rather than advocating for his client.”

Avenatti is also accused in the other indictment of telling lawyers for Nike “I’ll take ten billion dollars off your client’s market cap” by publicly accusing the company’s employees of authorizing and funding payments to families of top high school basketball players if Nike did not fork over millions of dollars to his client and to him personally.

Avenatti, in a response to an email requesting comment from CNBC, wrote:

In the Nike-related indictment unsealed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Avenatti is charged with extortion, conspiracy to commit extortion, conspiracy to transmit interstate communications with intent to extort, and transmission of interstate communications with intent to extort.