Stephen G. Yagman, a pugnacious lawyer who made a career of suing the Los Angeles Police Department and other law enforcement agencies, was sentenced Tuesday to three years in federal prison for tax evasion, money laundering and bankruptcy fraud.
He did not go quietly -- or quickly.
In an unusual courtroom hearing that spanned three days, Yagman and his attorneys painstakingly went over the evidence in the case and accused the U.S. attorney of targeting him because of his long and confrontational history with the federal government.
"A cage went in search of a bird," Yagman told U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson, quoting from Franz Kafka's book "The Zurau Aphorisms." "I'm the bird, and they got me."
Wearing a blue suit and a sailboat-decorated tie, Yagman also quoted from, or referred to, Woody Allen, Abraham Lincoln and Socrates during more than four hours of oration. At times, he was remorseful, but for the most part, he was defensive.
Government officials, he said, "want to scorch everything around me . . . destroy me."
Yagman's sentence, which includes an additional two years of supervised release after his prison term, was significantly less than the nine years that prosecutors had recommended. He is scheduled to surrender to authorities and begin serving his sentence Jan. 15.
The convictions, in all likelihood, mark an end to Yagman's work as a litigator. It was a career in which he occasionally broke new legal ground and antagonized some of L.A.'s most powerful leaders, often while representing gang members and other criminals who allegedly had been abused by the police.
Before imposing the sentence, Judge Wilson said he approached the case as he does all others, with a healthy skepticism of the charges. But after presiding over the trial, he said he became convinced of Yagman's guilt.
"The jury was right," he said.
Nonetheless, Wilson said, he allowed the hearing to carry on for three days so both sides could essentially re-argue evidence in the case "to make sure I wasn't missing something." At times, Wilson engaged Yagman in several prolonged question-and-answer sessions.
Ultimately, the judge said he concluded that Yagman had not only committed the crimes, but also lied and fabricated evidence to cover his tracks.
"Frankly, I was shocked by his testimony," Wilson said, calling it "transparently untrue in so many areas."
