Ahead of his sentencing hearing on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Josephine Staton heard testimonies from medical experts, witnesses, and the disbarred attorney himself before determining that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons could properly and safely care for Thomas, 86, despite his apparent dementia.
According to a June 2 report from the Los Angeles Daily News, a three-hour hearing was held on Monday, where Thomas’ legal team unsuccessfully attempted to convince Judge Staton to allow their client, who is currently estranged from Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Erika Jayne, 53, to serve out his term in a mental care facility.
During the hearing, a confused Thomas, who was convicted of stealing at least $15 million from his former clients last summer, was questioned by one of his attorneys, Sam Cross, about his recent travels.
The RHOBH star is expected to head to trial in the case sometime later this year.
“[I’ve] crisscrossed the country,” Thomas alleged as he claimed to have attended a meeting of the “National Academy” in New York, visited Buffalo, New York, and tended to a “case” in Oklahoma.
But for the past two years, Thomas has been residing in a memory care facility in Orange County, California, which he left only once, for six weeks, to be psychologically evaluated at FMC Butner, a federal prison in North Carolina for inmates with special needs.
Thomas also said he lived in “Pasadena,” and that he’d been venturing to his long-shuttered law firm, Girardi Keese, at the conclusion of the hearing.
Although Thomas claimed to have “serious memory loss,” the judge was convinced that he was more self-aware than he led on. In fact, after Thomas quickly pulled his pants up after they began to fall down, she took the behavior as proof that he was cognizant.
Still, Thomas’ attorney suggested he wouldn’t get the care he needed in prison.
“We believe he is in need of specialized treatment,” he told the judge, noting that Thomas was “frail, elderly” and in danger of being “exploited or taken advantage of.”
After all testimonies were heard, including comments from a BOP neuropsychologist and a BOP forensic psychologist, the judge concluded he would be safely housed in prison, saying, “He will be designated to an appropriate facility.”
The judge also ordered Thomas to pay $3.8 million in restitution for “a cunning fraud scheme against the injured clients he had a sworn duty to protect.”
Girardi’s “yearslong theft of client funds from his law firm’s trust accounts and the myriad lies he told to cover up his theft represent a calculated and devastating betrayal of the very people that turned to him for help in their darkest hour,” prosecutors wrote in their statement.
Prosecutors are hoping to see Thomas dealt with a 14-year prison term.
Thomas is also in the midst of bankruptcy proceedings. And due to her potential involvement in the spending of misappropriated client funds, Erika is being sued for $24 million by the trustee presiding over the bankruptcy case as she attempts to return the stolen funds to Thomas’ past clients.
