Tom Girardi has been sentenced to seven years and three months in federal prison after being found guilty in his wire fraud trial.
The disgraced lawyer, 86 years old and the estranged husband of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Erika Jayne, has been ordered to pay $2,310,247 in restitution to his victims and a $35,000 fine.
Judge Josephine L. Staton has also ordered Girardi to surrender to federal authorities by July 17.
DailyMail.com has contacted representatives for Girardi’s estranged wife Erika but did not immediately hear back.
In August, the once-powerful attorney was convicted on four charges of defrauding his severely injured or grieving clients of approximately $15 million in settlement fees.
Girardi, who established the prestigious LA law firm Girardi & Keese following his legal battle against a California utility giant that inspired the movie Erin Brockovich, faced four counts of wire fraud, to which he entered a plea of not guilty.
His high-rolling career came tumbling down in 2020 when he was accused of stealing millions in settlements he’d won for the victims of the 2018 Lion Air plane crash in Indonesia, a tragedy in which 189 people died.
‘This self-proclaimed “champion of justice” was nothing more than a thief and a liar who conned his vulnerable clients out of the millions of dollars,’ United States Attorney Bill Essayli said in a press release about the prison sentence.
Tom Girard has been sentenced to seven years and three months in prison after being found guilty in his wire fraud trial
The 86-year-old disgraced lawyer and estranged husband of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Erika Jayne has also been ordered to pay $2 million in restitution to his victims, according to NBC New s
‘My office will vigorously prosecute corrupt lawyers and those who assist them in criminal activities.’
Lawyers for Girardi, who is suffering from late-onset Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, had concerns about the defendant residing in prison amid his health woes.
Attorney Sam Cross, who is among Girardi’s lawyers, asked the judge on Monday to keep Girardi in his current assisted living facility instead sending him to federal prison, arguing he would not receive the proper care he needs in prison.
‘We believe he is in need of specialized treatment,’ Cross explained to the judge, according to Deadline.
He described Girardi as ‘frail, elderly’ and argued he would be at risk of being ‘exploited or taken advantage of’ in prison.
But the judge ultimately disagreed, concluding they can safely sentence Girardi to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility. ‘He will be designated to an appropriate facility,’ she said.
During the trial, the jury heard that between 2010 and 2020 the shamed attorney used his clients’ settlement funds ‘like a personal piggy bank.’
‘Girardi Keese was a den of thieves and Tom Girardi was the thief-in-chief,’ Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Paetty previously told the court.
‘Girardi Keese was a house of cards built on the lies of Tom Girardi.’
Girardi ran a massive ‘Ponzi scheme,’ lying to clients and using their misappropriated millions to pay for his own lavish lifestyle of private jets, luxury cars, exclusive club memberships, expensive jewelry for his third wife, ex-go-go dancer Jayne, 52, plus $20 million to fund her acting career.
The couple were together for 21 years but their divorce – filed by Jayne soon after the Lion Air allegations – has been held up since Girardi Keese filed bankruptcy in 2021 with more than $100 million in debts. Jayne never showed up at her soon-to-be- ex husband’s trial.
Girardi – who was disbarred in 2022 following the allegations against him – was portrayed by his defense team as suffering from dementia.
‘He got old, he got sick, he lost his mind,’ his attorney Charles Snyder previously told the court.
‘All the lights were on but there was nobody home. He lost touch with reality.’
The couple were together for 21 years but their divorce – filed by Jayne soon after the Lion Air allegations – has been held up since Girardi Keese filed bankruptcy in 2021 with more than $100 million in debts. Jayne never showed up at her soon-to-be- ex husband’s trial; the duo pictured in 2017
Girardi and his legal team also pointed the finger of blame at another man, Christopher Kamon, 49, the chief financial officer of Girardi Keese who they say stole between $50 million and $100 million from the company.
Kamon plead guilty to two counts of wire fraud and was sentenced to 121 months in federal prison in April in a separate trial.
During the trial, prosecutors told jurors that Girardi preyed on clients who were ‘in their darkest hours,’ suffering from terrible injuries or mourning the death of loved ones.
Joe Ruigomez – who desperately needed money to pay the giant medical bills for the horrible injuries he suffered in a 2020 gas explosion at his home that killed his girlfriend – was told by Girardi that his settlement from the PG&E utility was $5 million, when it was actually $50 million.
Another Girardi client, Judy Selberg, hired the once-acclaimed lawyer to bring an unlawful death lawsuit after her husband Paul was killed in a boating accident in April 2018.
Girardi won $500,000 for her but at the time of the guilty verdict, more than four years after the settlement, she’s still owed a large portion of that.
He also held up Erica Saldana’s $2.5 million settlement which she needed to pay the medical bills for the devastating injuries her one-year-old son suffered in a car crash.
And Josie Hernandez had to declare bankruptcy because Girardi didn’t pay her the money she was owed from a settlement over a medical device injury.
In all these cases, when the clients called or emailed Girardi to ask when they were going to get their money, he came up with excuses like there was a lien or ‘holdback’ on the settlement, that there was an IRS issue or a judge needed to ‘sign off’ before the money could be paid. All these claims were false.
‘He lied to his clients over and over and over again about why they weren’t being paid,’ Assistant U.S. Attorney Ali Moghaddas previously told the court. ‘He lied to them them because he did not want to give them their money because it was gone….it was already spent.
‘Behind the curtain he was pilfering his clients’ funds. It was just cruel to treat victims in this manner.
‘He was buying two private jets while his clients weren’t getting paid…. This this case is a simple and sad story of trust violated and greed.’
