[Miami Herald via Debra Cassens Weiss at the ABA Journal]
It didn’t seem like former high flying Miami personal injury lawyer Louis Robles was about to be sentenced to prison. The former attorney, “look[ing] trim and younger than his years” laughed with his public defender and smiled at family members before the hearing began.
Then the hammer fell: Robles, who plead guilty to bilking elderly asbestos clients out of their share of settlement proceeds exceeding $13 million, was sentenced to 15 years in prison, and ordered to pay back the money.
Prosecutors had originally recommended a 10-year sentence under a plea deal but U.S. District Judge Alan Gold refused to accept it.
But rather than pass the money along to his clients, Robles used it to fuel a lavish lifestyle, which included apartments in Los Angeles, New York and Colorado as well as a 9,000 square-foot mansion on Biscayne Bay and to finance forays into the movie production business.
Read FBI press release: MIAMI ATTORNEY INDICTED FOR MISAPPROPRIATING AT LEAST $13.5 MILLION IN CLIENT SETTLEMENT MONEY
It didn’t seem like former high flying Miami personal injury lawyer Louis Robles was about to be sentenced to prison. The former attorney, “look[ing] trim and younger than his years” laughed with his public defender and smiled at family members before the hearing began.
Then the hammer fell: Robles, who plead guilty to bilking elderly asbestos clients out of their share of settlement proceeds exceeding $13 million, was sentenced to 15 years in prison, and ordered to pay back the money.
Prosecutors had originally recommended a 10-year sentence under a plea deal but U.S. District Judge Alan Gold refused to accept it.
''What makes this crime so egregious is he stole money from the ill and infirm without conscious or concern,'' Gold said.Called the King of Torts, Robles represented more than 7,000 asbestos claimants throughout the United States, and his former law firm collected more than $164 million on behalf of his asbestos clients between 1989 and 2002, according to the indictment.
But rather than pass the money along to his clients, Robles used it to fuel a lavish lifestyle, which included apartments in Los Angeles, New York and Colorado as well as a 9,000 square-foot mansion on Biscayne Bay and to finance forays into the movie production business.
Read FBI press release: MIAMI ATTORNEY INDICTED FOR MISAPPROPRIATING AT LEAST $13.5 MILLION IN CLIENT SETTLEMENT MONEY
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