Adult film actress Stormy Daniels stands with her lawyer Michael Avenatti outside federal court in New York last year. Federal prosecutors in New York City say Avenatti used a doctored document to divert about $300,000 that Daniels was supposed to get from a book deal, then used the money for personal and business expenses. Photo: Mary Altaffer/AP

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan on Wednesday announced they have charged Michael Avenatti with fraud and aggravated identity theft for allegedly stealing nearly $300,000 from his former client and adult film star, Stephanie Clifford, who performs under the name Stormy Daniels.

In an unsealed federal indictment, prosecutors said that Avenatti had stolen a “significant portion” of an advance Clifford was being paid on a book deal.

Prosecutors alleged that Avenatti forged Clifford's name on a letter to her literary agent, instructing two payments of nearly $150,000 to be sent to a bank account under Avenatti's control. According to the indictment, Clifford did not know about the bank account, and half of the diverted sum has yet to be repaid.

The indictment claimed that Avenatti had used the funds for a range of personal and professional purposes unrelated to his client, including paying employees of his law firm and coffee business and to pay for flights, hotels and dry cleaning.

Clifford was not named in the indictment, but could be identified as “Victim-1.” On Wednesday, Avenatti tweeted that “no monies relating to Ms. Daniels were ever misappropriated or mishandled.”

“I look forward to a jury hearing all of the evidence and passing judgment on my conduct,” he said in a later tweet.

“I will be fully exonerated once the relevant emails, contracts, text messages, and documents are presented,” Avenatti wrote in the post.

A public relations contact for Clifford did not respond to an email Wednesday seeking comment on the allegations against her former attorney.

The latest allegations came as two new indictments against Avenatti had been unsealed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

In a separate indictment, prosecutors also accused Avenatti, who is 48, of extorting Nike Inc. by threatening to go public with supposedly damaging information if the sports-apparel giant didn't hire him to conduct an internal company investigation.

Avenatti was arrested in March in connection with the alleged extortion scheme and has suggested in recent days that he expected an indictment was coming. An attorney for Avenatti did not return a call Wednesday seeking comment.

According to the filing, Avenatti and an unnamed co-conspirator on March 19 told Nike attorneys in New York that Avenatti's client, a basketball coach in California, had evidence Nike employees had made payments to top high-school basketball players and threatened to announce the allegations at a news conference, just ahead of the National Collegiate Athletic Association men's basketball tournament and a quarterly corporate earnings call.

New York Law Journal has previously reported that the meeting included Nike's outside counsel from Boies Schiller Flexner, and other news reports have identified the co-conspirator as attorney Mark Geragos, who has not been charged.

In a follow-up conversations that were either monitored or reviewed by law enforcement, authorities said Avenatti made clear that he expected to a $1.5 million settlement for his client and that he himself expected to be paid between $15 million and $25 million as a part of the scheme.

Avenatti rose to national prominence while representing Clifford, who filed a lawsuit claiming she was paid thousands of dollars during the 2016 presidential campaign to keep quiet about a sexual affair with President Donald Trump.

According the Wednesday's indictment, Avenatti helped Clifford secure a book contract but began defrauding his client in August 2018 through February 2019. After diverting the first payment, prosecutors said Avenatti attempted to cover his tracks by paying Daniels using another source of money.

When Daniels asked why her advance payments were late, authorities said Avenatti blamed the delay on her publisher. Clifford still hasn't received the second installment of $148,750, they said.

If convicted, he faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for one count of wire fraud and up to an additional two years for aggravated identity theft.

“Far from zealously representing his client, Avenatti, as alleged, instead engaged in outright deception and theft, victimizing rather than advocating for his client,” U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman.

Avenatti has been charged separately in California with 36 counts of tax fraud, bankruptcy fraud and stealing from clients. H. Dean Steward, a criminal defense attorney in San Clemente, California, recently joined Avenatti's defense team in that case, ALM reported last week.