High Profile Lawyer Michael Avenatti Allegedly Funded His Racing Team With Embezzled Money

Bradley Brownell
Yesterday 3:00pm Filed to: RACING

If you’ve been paying attention to the ridiculous news cycle over the last year or so, you’ll know Michael Avenatti as the lawyer who was representing adult film star Stormy Daniels in a lawsuit against President Donald Trump. Avenatti’s an avid tweeter, and has inserted himself into many news cycle narratives lately, even saying that he was planning to run for president himself in 2020, despite some pretty serious criminal charges as of late.

What you may not have known was that Avenatti co-owned and raced for GB Autosport, and even raced at Le Mans in 2015. A new grand jury indictment alleges that his motorsport activity was paid for with extremely ill gotten gains.

The indictment includes allegations of several counts of wire fraud, tax fraud, bank fraud, aggravated identity theft, embezzlement of client funds, and more.

Avenatti has been holding a delicate balance of finances for years, apparently. “Money generated from one set of crimes was used to further other crimes,” U.S. Attorney Nick Hanna told the Chicago Tribune. “Typically in the form of payments designed to string along victims so as to prevent Mr. Avenatti’s financial house of cards from collapsing.”

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In the meantime, client money is charged to have been filtering through several Avenatti properties to purchase a private jet and start the GB Autosport team funding. And that’s just the law firm side of things.

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