The California State Bar has accused a Los Angeles-area attorney of attempting to recruit Israeli hackers to steal personal emails and text messages belonging to a local judge and a California consumer lawyer.
The State Bar’s June 6 Notice of Disciplinary Charges against Tarzana attorney Michael Libman reads like a tale of international intrigue, complete with details such as encrypted burner phones, hotel-room rendezvous, secretive attempts to purchase semi-automatic rifles, an FBI informant and corruption allegations stemming from a botched upgrade of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s (DWP’s) billing system more than a decade ago.
Libman had been hired in 2015 to represent a ratepayer plaintiff in a class action filed against the city over utility billing errors that eventually cost the DWP hundreds of millions of dollars. He has been accused of colluding with attorneys hired by the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office in an apparent bid by the city to manage the DWP litigation in a way that would benefit city interests and not the ratepayer plaintiffs, according to State Bar filings.
“... Respondent (Libman) sought to gain unauthorized access to the email and phone accounts of a sitting Superior Court judge and a California attorney and thereby intentionally engaged in an act or acts involving moral turpitude, dishonesty, collusion and corruption in willful violation of Business and Professions Code …” the June 6 Notice of Disciplinary Charges states.
One of Libman’s attorneys, Megan Zavieh, provided a statement to the Southern California Record that says Libman was not involved in actual “hacking” or buying or owning any illegal weapons.
“Although Mr. Libman is a citizen of both the U.S. and Israel, Mr. Libman denies in the strongest possible words that he has any affiliation with Israeli military intelligence or cyber espionage agencies or agents, including Mossad, as suggested by the State Bar’s absurd accusations,” the statement says.
The statement emphasizes that no criminal allegations have been leveled against him by investigators.
“No criminal charges were ever brought against Mr. Libman in connection with the class-action settlement on behalf of ratepayers in connection with the LADWP overbilling fiasco nor in connection with the allegations in this Notice of Disciplinary Charges,” the statement says. “The State Bar’s allegations are completely meritless and do not constitute misconduct or acts of moral turpitude even if they were true. Mr. Libman denies these accusations vehemently and will oppose them vigorously.”
The hacking charges laid out by the State Bar relate to events that occurred in 2019 and 2020 during proceedings before Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle in the case of Antwon Jones v. City of Los Angeles. In April 2019, the court appointed a new class counsel in the case, attorney Brian Kabateck.
“Respondent was convinced that Judge Berle and Kabateck, not him, were involved in inappropriate conduct, including but not limited to, failing to disclose inappropriate connections between them,” the State Bar alleges in its notice. “Respondent sought to expose Judge Berle and Kabateck’s conduct by creating a plan to hack into Judge Berle and Kabateck’ s personal emails and phone accounts.”
The State Bar filing also describes how a New York attorney, Paul Paradis, allegedly became a middleman between Libman and Israeli hackers. Paradis at one time represented the city in legal actions against the company that oversaw the rollout of the DWP billion system, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC).
“Unbeknownst to (the) respondent, Paradis was working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as a confidential informant,” the Notice of Disciplinary Charges says. “In his role as a confidential informant, and as directed by the FBI, Mr. Paradis recorded his phone calls and meetings with (the) respondent.”
Libman also tasked Paradis with purchasing “shotguns and some high-power rifles” in Arizona because Libman claimed he could not purchase such weapons at Big 5 Sporting Goods in California, according to the State Bar’s narrative.
The FBI executed a search warrant at Libman’s home in June of 2020, according to the State Bar.