The Real Scammers of Beverly Hills Tom Girardi has been one of the top lawyers
in the game for decades.
He had a hand in several high-profile legal cases over the years and, as a result, built
a sterling reputation as one of the nation's premier lawyers.
On top of that, he was married to Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Erika Jayne.
They were a bonafide celebrity power couple—and then it all fell apart.
Girardi now finds himself in an explosive divorce after a massive financial scandal
left him disbarred and disgraced.
So how did Girardi go from lawyer to loser on national T.V.?
The Hollywood Effect In most cases, the celebrities we admire aren't
models of morality and goodness.
When the Hollywood lights and cameras are stripped away, we get a glimpse of who these
people really are.
In most cases, they aren't as perfect as they appear.
Tom Girardi and Erika Jayne are prime examples of that.
They had the kind of life that most people dream about.
The 82-year old trial attorney and his 49-year old reality-star wife were living large in
L.A. She was a star on Bravo's "Real Housewives of Beverly Hills."
He served as a prominent member of America's elite class.
From Riches to Rags Before their lives went up in flames, it sounded
like the premise to its own reality show: a rich, aging, bigwig lawyer marries a younger
woman whose career as an actress and singer led to a spot on reality T.V.
Their partnership, though, didn't have the fairytale ending they hoped for.
A few years ago, Girardi's net worth was estimated in the realm of $250 million.
His legendary successes in court had garnered him a gigantic fortune, and it didn't hurt
to have a reality T.V. star in the house as well.
In the last two years, however, he has watched helplessly as all of that money has melted
away.
Their lovely Pasadena Mansion, a certified dream home to us ordinary people, has been
emptied of their belongings and is listed on the market for $13 million.
The massive fortune he had collected over the years is completely gone.
He recently filed for bankruptcy and is in nearly $60 million in debt.
Once the house was gone and the money dried up, the wife went out the door soon after.
Jayne filed for divorce following Girardi's fall from wealth.
Her decision to end things with her 82-year old husband made for a dramatic moment on
a recent episode of "Real Housewives of Beverly Hills," where viewers were offered an inside
look at the days leading up to her divorce back in November of 2020.
It wasn't "till death do us part" for the celebrity duo, but rather "till endless lawsuits
and no more cash do us part."
Hollywood Rise Things weren't always so bleak for Girardi,
who'd made a name for himself before his wife was even born.
After graduating from Loyola Law School in 1964 and NYU School of Law in '65, Girardi
partnered with Robert Keese to co-found the LA-based law firm "Girardi & Keese."
One of his first notable legal battles came in 1970 when he became the first lawyer in
the history of California to win his client more than a million dollars in a medical malpractice
case.
Girardi was a talented attorney, but it wasn't until the '90s that he became a household
name.
Girardi was involved in the famous case that would go on to inspire the Oscar-nominated
2000 film titled Erin Brockovich, starring Julia Roberts.
The case involved Pacific Gas & Electric, which was accused of leaking 340 million gallons
of contaminated wastewater in and around the town of Hinkley, California.
Pacific Gas's reckless dumping into the town's water supply was investigated after Hinkley
residents mysteriously contracted cancer and other diseases.
The company ultimately settled with the town of Hinkley, agreeing to pay a sum of $460
million to residents potentially affected by the contaminated water.
Girardi was one of the key players on the side of Hinkley residents.
The Hollywood retelling of the story focuses primarily on Erin Brockovich, a legal clerk
whose investigation into Pacific Gas & Electric was integral to the case against the shady
company.
Nevertheless, Girardi was still an important figure in the trial and gained plenty of notoriety
following his involvement in the case.
In 2014, he was inducted into the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame for his accomplishments.
We didn't even know there was a Lawyer Hall of Fame!
Star Crossed Lovers While he was having record-setting professional
success, Girardi's personal life wasn't doing so well.
He'd already been married and divorced twice by the late '90s, and it appeared that a lifelong
partnership wasn't in the cards for old man Tom.
At the same time, a cocktail waitress named Erika Jayne was working in Los Angeles to
pursue her dream of becoming a singer.
The two met one fateful evening and, as the story goes, hit it off despite their 32-year
age difference.
Jayne has insisted that she doesn't mind that her husband is old enough to be her father
and that everyone else focuses on that fact way more than she does.
Her love may be blind to age, but there's no doubt that Girardi's deep pockets have
something to do with it.
The couple got married in 1999 and started a new life together.
Their marriage was an unconventional pairing.
Erika says she would often act as a sounding board for Girardi as he worked on various
legal cases.
At business dinners, she'd entertain the wives while Girardi worked to close the deals.
The millionaire attorney pledged to buy his wife anything her heart desired - although
he didn't want to wear a wedding ring and refrained from doing so throughout their time
as husband and wife.
Money, Money, Money No matter how strange their relationship seemed,
it was definitely supported by the pool of cash they were swimming in.
Girardi was able to keep his younger bride happy, if only by way of the checks he signed.
He spent loads of money on her behalf during their relationship, including expensive jewelry,
renovations to their Pasadena estate, and even direct funding of Erika's music career.
Girardi siphoned $20 million away from his law firm and sunk it into the wannabe singer's
career.
The couple's prolific spending habits didn't stop there.
Erika had access to a bottomless pool of Girardi's money and was not shy about shelling out her
husband's hard-earned dollars.
She even took her so-called "glam squad," a team of hair and make-up stylists that costs
$40,000-per-month, on trips to Dubai and other exotic locales, all of it on her husband's
dime.
Her explanation for the high-priced vacations?
She simply said, "That's how I live."
Girardi wasn't immune from spending big himself.
He bought himself private jets, a collection of luxury real estate, and even drove around
in a flashy quarter-million-dollar Lamborghini.
During a 2020 deposition, Girardi detailed that he once had $50 million in cash and another
50-million in stocks.
Now, he doesn't have a cent to his name.
We know where the money went, but where was it supposed to go?
Lion Air Scandal In late 2020, Girardi woke up to a whole mess
of lawsuits on his front step, all of them connected to his involvement with the Lion
Air Flight 610 crash in Indonesia.
The horrific accident took place on October 29, 2018.
A total of 189 passengers and crew members climbed aboard a Boeing 737 MAX airplane—flight
610.
The plane crashed into the Java Sea shortly after takeoff.
Sadly, nobody survived the crash.
Girardi got involved in the legal proceedings following the accident.
His firm, Girardi & Keese, helped the families of those lost in the crash recoup funds from
Boeing in massive million-dollar settlements.
There was just one problem: the families never saw any of that money.
Girardi's firm received the funds directly from Boeing in the Spring of 2020.
They were supposed to distribute the funds to the victims, but that never happened.
As it turns out, Girardi had taken the money from Boeing and was spending it on himself.
The victim's funds went towards the outrageous lifestyle he and his wife had grown accustomed
to.
But why would Girardi use the settlement money to pay for all that stuff?
Surely his booming legal business could fit the bill, right?
Well, as it turns out, Girardi had fallen head over heels in debt.
Between his wife and his law firm, his money was quickly evaporating.
Girardi owed a ton of cash to litigation funders in particular.
Litigation funders are like legal loan sharks for lawyers.
Suppose an attorney's client cannot cover the legal fees associated with their case,
whether hiring expert witnesses or just paying their attorney.
In that case, a litigation fund company can step in to cover those fees.
In return, that company gets a portion of the settlement money and interest on their
loan.
In the case of Flight 610, an international case involving hundreds of families, witnesses,
and expert opinions, it's no wonder Girardi and Keese had to seek out investors to fund
the case.
Girardi had been utilizing the services of various litigation funders before Flight 610,
but he had neglected to pay them too.
In turn, he was using embezzled funds meant for the grieving victims of Flight 610 to
fend off the hungry litigation funders looking for their money.
Girardi had a fair amount of other creditors.
The law firm also owed a ton of settlement money to other clients.
For example, Girardi owed $200,000 to the mother of a deceased NFL player and $11 Million
to the family of a burn victim.
The mother received a check from Girardi's bank account to cover the debt, which should
have raised a red flag from the start.
Legally, settlement money must be kept in a separate trust account and not mixed in
with the lawyer's money.
The burn victim's family put Erika on the stand to answer for the missing cash.
Tom took her place and testified that the money was gone.
The list of people that Girardi owed money to was growing by the day.
He was backed into a corner with no way out, and he resorted to defrauding his clients
instead of facing the consequences of his financial mishaps.
Politics It was a monumental fall from grace for a
man who was chumming it up with the likes of President Biden and the Clintons as recently
as 2019.
Girardi was active in the political fundraising scene for decades, having raised and personally
donated millions of dollars to various Democratic campaigns over the years.
His most recent political involvement came during Biden's presidential run; Girardi put
together a breakfast fundraiser at the Jonathan Club in downtown L.A.
By the time Biden was being sworn into office, Girardi's life was in utter chaos.
Girardi's political exploits went beyond expensive shindigs for the political elite.
The savvy lawyer seemingly had connections all over Washington, D.C., and the rest of
the nation as well.
He had direct lines to U.S. Congressmen and Governors across the country that were willing
to grant Girardi favors in exchange for access to his wallet.
As more and more details have come to light about the true nature of Tom Girardi's endeavors,
it's become evident that he had a skewed moral compass.
The last few years show how low he was willing to stoop when he had nowhere else to turn.
Legal Trouble The lawsuits keep piling up for Girardi.
More of his past clients and creditors have come forward detailing how Girardi failed
to pay them the tens of millions of dollars he owes.
The Lion Air case may be what got Girardi caught, but it wasn't the first time he stole
from his clients.
While Erika's sudden move to divorce Tom may have been an attempt to shield herself from
any legal battles, she too is scheduled in court to testify on Girardi's financial misdeeds.
The nitty, gritty details of Tom and Erika's whirlwind year are documented in a brand new
Hulu documentary called The Housewife and the Hustler.
The tell-all doc shines a light on what was going on in the Girardi household for all
these years and investigates the extent to which Erika might be culpable in her husband's
wrongdoing.
2021 Life Girardi has now filed for involuntary bankruptcy.
His money, law practice, and reputation have all gone up in flames.
Erika's divorce papers were just the final nail in the coffin.
On top of all of that, it seems his mind is almost gone too.
The disgraced lawyer was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's and will live out the remainder
of his years penniless and alone.
In the meantime, the real-life drama surrounding the celebrity odd-couple will showcase on
the latest season of "Real Housewives of Beverly Hills."
America can tune right into Girardi's colossal fall from grace as he and Erika attempt to
salvage remnants of their past lives going forward.
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