John Galliano’s former lawyer convicted on appeal of embezzling the designer’s funds

John Galliano‘s former lawyer was given a two-year suspended prison sentence on appeal on Tuesday, identical to the term imposed at first instance, for misappropriating funds from the designer’s bank accounts and those of one of his companies.

The Paris Court of Appeal upheld the June 2023 judgment of the criminal court, which had found Stéphane Zerbib guilty of breach of trust totalling 856,500 euros between 2008 and 2011, and of the use of forged documents.

John Galliano lodged a complaint in April 2011 against his former lawyer, accusing him of misappropriating around three million euros by withdrawing cash or making bank transfers without his knowledge.

The designer had just been dismissed by the House of Dior after hurling antisemitic insults at patrons in a Paris bar in February 2011, and was undergoing treatment for his “addictions” at a rehabilitation clinic in Arizona.

At the hearing, Stéphane Zerbib denied any fraudulent withdrawals from the accounts of his former client and from one of his companies, Cheyenne Freedom.

The Court of Appeal also upheld a one-year suspended prison sentence for Stéphane Zerbib’s wife, Danielle Nahon, a legal adviser who also advised John Galliano at the time, for breach of trust, use of forged documents and unlawfully holding herself out as a lawyer.

The lawyer and his wife were ordered to jointly pay John Galliano 145,000 euros in material damages and 5,000 euros in moral damages, as well as 606,605 euros to the company Cheyenne Freedom.