Erika Girardi appeared in court with husband Tom Girardi in fraud case

• Erika Girardi has arrived in court with her estranged husband, Tom Girardi.
• He is accused of stealing more than $3 million from relatives of victims killed in the Lion Air Flight 610 tragedy.
• Erika claims she was uninformed of Tom’s alleged criminal behavior in relation to the 2018.

Erika Girardi, a Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star, has arrived in court with her estranged husband, Tom Girardi. The retired lawyer, 83, was shown Monday entering a courthouse in Los Angeles with his attorneys after being indicted on fraud charges last week for allegedly taking from the relatives of victims in a 2018 plane tragedy.

Girardi is charged by a federal grand jury in Chicago with eight charges of wire fraud and four counts of criminal contempt of court, according to court records that source previously received.

He is accused of stealing more than $3 million from relatives of victims killed in the Lion Air Flight 610 tragedy, together with two other employees of his legal company Girardi Keese, according to a news statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois.

Each of David R. Lira and Christopher K. Kamon faces 12 additional felony counts. Kamon oversaw the organization’s accounting and finance division.

Five clients were represented by Girardi and Lira whose relatives perished in the 2018 accident. According to a press release, they sued Boeing Co., the company that made the plane, and the disputes were eventually resolved.

Together with Kamon, they are accused of using more than $3 million in settlement money for “improper reasons, including providing settlements to additional Girardi Keese clients and paying the firm’s employees and operating costs.”

They then allegedly tried to hide the theft from their clients by blaming the COVID-19 outbreak and “severe challenges” with Boeing for the delayed allocation of payments. They also made fraudulent statements while being aware that the law firm had already received the settlement money, according to the indictment.

After 21 years of marriage, Erika filed for divorce from her estranged spouse as the racketeering and embezzlement claims were intensifying. There were both criminal and civil accusations, the latter of which also named Erika.

Erika claims she was uninformed of Tom’s alleged criminal behavior in relation to the 2018 plane disaster victims, which led to the California Federal Court disbarring him. There are no federal lawsuits that mention her.

The plaintiffs who were suing Erika for allegedly “aiding and abetting” her estranged husband in a fraudulent scheme were recently found to have failed to establish that she had any knowledge of the alleged crimes, which Erika took as a positive development despite the fact that the legal battle is still ongoing.

“Two years now, down the road, we’re getting some really great rulings, and I’m grateful for that,” she said during the RHOBH panel in October at BravoCon 2022. “And more to go… So I’m in a much better place, and I’m grateful for that.”

Tom was given a dementia and late-onset Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis in March 2021, in the midst of his legal troubles and divorce from Erika. He was sent to a nursing home with round-the-clock care that July.

In February 2021, his younger brother was given interim conservatorship over the ex-attorney, which was later made permanent in July 2021.

Erika provided an update on Tom’s health during a May interview on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, informing the host Andy Cohen that his status had not changed.

“Tom lives in a memory care facility… Look, I can only say decline and further decline, it will not get better,” she said, noting that Tom still often reaches out, though their phone calls “last about five seconds.”

Then, when Cohen questioned Erika about whether Tom is aware of his legal issues, Erika replied, “He thinks he’s still practising law.”

Tom’s health continued to decline, so in October he was transferred to an assisted living facility’s “limited memory care unit.” The 83-year-old was sent to the facility “due to a further loss in his memory functions,” according to court documents acquired by news from Tom’s court-appointed attorney Rudy M. A. Cosio.

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