A new york judge ruled Friday that Steve Bannon, former White House adviser and one-time Trump administration official, must pay his former legal team more than $480,000 in unpaid legal fees.
The Epoch Times reached out to Mr. Bannon for comment.
Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, LLP, a law firm that previously represented Mr. Bannon in a series of legal problems, alleged that the former White House adviser didn’t pay the full amount of billed legal fees.
The law firm had defended Mr. Bannon in several cases including the “We Build The Wall” fundraising fraud case in the Southern District of New York (SDNY), the subpoena from the House Jan. 6 Select Committee, a federal criminal case in the District of Columbia, and an investigation by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office from November 2022 and November 2022.
Bannon also secured a presidential pardon for himself in 2020 with the help of Davidoff Hutcher & Citron, LLP.
The law firm stopped representing Mr. Bannon in late 2022 after he didn’t pay legal fees and sued him, claiming that he paid only $375,000 out of the total $850,000 billed in legal fees.
Mr. Bannon contended the claims by saying that he told the law firm to stop working for him in January 2022, the law firm was working on matters unrelated to the retainer agreement under disputes, and an attorney from the law firm would possibly become a witness in one of the cases.
The judge rejected all of Mr. Bannon’s motions.
The retainer agreement covers a wide range of matters and does not limit the law firm’s legal services to the SDNY case, the judge found.
Meanwhile, Mr. Bannon was actively seeking legal representation from Davidoff Hutcher & Citron well after January 2022 when he reportedly told the law firm to stop providing legal services.
“Defendant’s assertion that he need not pay legal fees because an attorney for plaintiff might be a witness in the case in the District of Columbia is also without merit. As plaintiff pointed out, Mr. Costello filed a notice of withdrawal in that case in July 2022, well after the time defendant allegedly told plaintiff to stop representing him. Nor did defendant adequately explain how the fact that an attorney might be called as a witness is a valid defense to not paying legal bills,” the judge wrote in the ruling.
Mr. Bannon was sentenced to four months in prison and ordered to pay a $6,500 fine in October 2022 for refusing to comply with a subpoena from the House Jan. 6 Select Committee.
His jail term is pending until the results of his appeal.
