A U.S. federal judge on Monday rejected Michael Avenatti’s bid to dismiss two of the three counts in an indictment accusing the celebrity lawyer of trying to extort Nike Inc. U.S. District Judge Paul Gardephe in Manhattan said prosecutors had sufficiently alleged that Avenatti engaged in wrongful conduct by threatening Nike with economic and reputational harm if it did not pay him millions of dollars. The third count accused Avenatti of honest services wire fraud.
