Ex-Girardi Keese CFO Sentenced to 65 Months in Prison After Plea

The former head of accounting at disgraced California law firm Girardi Keese was sentenced to 65 months in prison after pleading guilty in a scheme to misappropriate client funds, according to a spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois.

Christopher Kamon pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in Chicago federal court pursuant to an agreement with prosecutors that his sentence would run concurrent with his 10-year term in a California case that also alleged the theft of client money.

Girardi Keese represented victims of a 2018 Lion Air crash in Indonesia in their suits against Boeing. Kamon facilitated star attorney Tom Girardi’s theft of settlement funds from five clients who lost loved ones in the crash, according to prosecutors.

Kamon’s attorneys requested a three-year sentence, arguing his role in the fraud was relatively minimal. Prosecutors, however, asked for more than seven years.

In a handwritten letter filed with the court, Kamon said his time so far in federal custody has been “the scariest, most painful, most traumatic and longest 3 years” of his life, and he has repeatedly witnessed violence and lived among “just some of the most terrifying people in the world.”

“Please know, I am not saying I am a victim or asking for sympathy, I just would like the true victims to know I am being punished for my actions and I truly hope it gives them justice knowing that,” he wrote.

Girardi was charged in the scheme alongside his son-in-law David Lira. Girardi’s Chicago charges were dropped at prosecutors’ request earlier this year. Lira pleaded guilty to one count of contempt last month; his sentencing hearing is scheduled for October.

The Chicago sentencing follows the closure of the blockbuster cases against Girardi and Kamon in the Central District of California, which also alleged embezzlement of client funds.

Kamon pleaded guilty to wire fraud in the California case last year. Girardi went to trial and was convicted on four fraud counts. He was sentenced to more than seven years in prison, effectively a life term for the 86-year-old.

Kamon is represented by Severo Law Firm.

The case is US v. Kamon, N.D. Ill., No. 1:23-cr-00054, change of plea and sentencing 7/14/25.