Wall Street giant lashes out at 32-year-old fraudster after ill-fated $US175m deal

What would you do if the federal government wanted you to go to prison and Jamie Dimon was paying your legal bills?

Here’s what Charlie Javice did: He spent money on luxury hotel upgrades, extravagant meals and cellulite oil, a personal care product some people use to treat their skin, a lawyer for the bank said at a hearing Friday.

He then sent the receipts to the bank.

According to recent legal filings, Javice has spent more than $60 million ($92 million) on his defense, and that’s still counting. The bank described the sum as “an unprecedented and shocking amount that exceeds all reasonableness.” That seems to be tens of millions of dollars more than Elizabeth Holmes’ legal fees, for example.

In September, Javice, 32, was sentenced to more than seven years in prison for fraud. In 2021, JPMorgan Chase acquired startup Frank for US$175 million ($268 million). Javice claimed that his company had helped millions of people fill out federal financial aid forms.

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However, after the purchase, the bank discovered that Frank had been lying about most of his customers. JPMorgan filed suit, and prosecutors then took Javice to trial. The jury convicted him this year.

In the process, Javice won a judgment requiring the bank to pay attorneys’ fees. JPMorgan had disputed the size of the fees in the past and decided to cut him off following his sentencing. The bank is trying the same maneuver with former growth and procurement chief Olivier Amar, who was also convicted of fraud.

JPMorgan said in a filing last month that Javice had retained five separate law firms and that he and his lawyers treated the original order forcing the bank to pay defense costs as “a blank check to bill and spend whatever they want.” The lawyers he used also represented Elon Musk, Harvey Weinstein, and Sam Bankman-Fried.