A lawyer just like in the movies

Criminal defense attorney James Warner pleaded guilty today (July 15) to laundering $100,000 of a client's drug-trafficking proceeds and then tampering with a potential witness in the case.

According to the plea agreement, federal drug agents searched the home of a Warner client in 2012. The drug trafficker told Warner the agents missed $100,000 in cash during the search. Warner agreed to conceal the money.

Warner then stashed $99,965 of his own money in an account in the British Virgin Islands, a tax and secrecy haven. Warner then structured the $100,000 from the drug trafficker into his personal bank accounts to disguise the nature of the proceeds. Warner admitted creating a fictitious corporation named Grenadine Development and opened an account in that name to issue checks to the trafficker.

Warner also admitted tampering with a witness when he told his client to pay the legal fees of another trafficker to prevent the other trafficker from cooperating with law enforcement. Warner's client drug trafficker is identified as "T.K."

Bond was set at $5000. At a hearing October 16, Warner will face a statutory maximum sentence of 23 years in federal prison.