Football brain damage claim won't help lawyer convicted of fraud, appeals court says

A federal jury last year convicted former Memphis personal injury lawyer George Skouteris Jr. of repeatedly stealing money from his clients. Now, an appeals court has rejected Skouteris' argument that the jury should have received instructions to consider his possible brain damage from playing football.

The 60-year-old former lawyer was sentenced in December to 30 months in prison and three years of supervised release and has also been ordered to pay more than $147,000 in restitution to victims.

Skouteris filed an appeal challenging the conviction and sentence on multiple grounds, including the football brain damage claim - news clippings from the late 1970s and early 1980s refer to Skouteris playing football for Memphis University School and later for Memphis State University.

Writing for a three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, Circuit Judge Chad Readler used multiple football metaphors as he explained why the panel denied the claims.

"Following his playing days, Skouteris moved from the stadium to the courtroom, practicing as a personal injury lawyer," the judge's summary says.

"His client service, however, was more in the form of a turnover than a touchdown," the judge wrote. "Case in point, he routinely settled cases without client permission, forged client signatures on settlement checks, and then deposited those checks into his own account. Complaints from angry clients mounted, as did interest by state and federal authorities."

"At his jury trial for federal bank fraud (in April 2021) Skouteris argued that his days on the gridiron had left him with mental impairments—including possible chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE)—that cast doubt on whether he had the requisite state of mind to commit bank fraud."

"The jury disagreed and found Skouteris guilty of the charged offense. He was sentenced to 30 months’ imprisonment and ordered to pay nearly $150,000 in restitution. On appeal, Skouteris argues that his football injuries warrant a replay of his jury trial or, in the alternative, his sentencing. We disagree and therefore affirm."

Skouteris had faced theft allegations for years. He lost his law license in 2014, but kept practicing law anyway and stole from more clients, according to records from the Tennessee Board of Professional Responsibility. The appeals court opinion highlighted the case of Tiffany Williams, whose fiancée was killed in a car crash that also badly injured her. She hired Skouteris as her lawyer, but struggled to get information from him.

"Eventually, she learned that Skouteris had settled the case (for $197,480) without her knowledge. Worse yet, Williams discovered that Skouteris had signed her name to the settlement check and deposited the proceeds into hisaccount at Trust One Bank," the appeals ruling said.

She and several other clients told the jury of similar experiences.

The appeals judge wrote that the central issue at Skouteris' trial was whether he had the intent to commit bank fraud.

An expert for the defense said Skouteris had a “major depressive disorder,” “alcohol use disorder,” and “seizure disorder” which began during his football career. The expert concluded that these disorders would have led to errors in handling of client settlements, according to the appeals court summary.

The prosecution's expert agreed that Skouteris suffered from depression and alcohol use disorder but concluded that Skouteris was “capable of having the mental ability to form and carry out complex thoughts, schemes, and plans,” according to the appeals court summary.

Skouteris' attorney wanted the jury to have an additional instruction explaining that evidence of "diminished mental capacity" could weaken the case that Skouteris intentionally committed bank fraud. The trial judge denied the request to include that instruction to the jury.

On appeal, Skouteris' lawyer Josie S. Holland said those instructions should have been included.

"A specific intent crime, like (bank fraud) requires a defendant to act with the purpose of violating law, something more than just a knowing violation . . . At times, Appellant ran his business chaotically and inefficiently due to a brain injury," the lawyer wrote in an appeals brief.

The appeals judge panel cited testimony that said Skouteris didn't appear to have brain damage.

"Former clients and colleagues described Skouteris as a detail-oriented lawyer who did not exhibit signs of a diminished mental capacity. Jurors also heard that Skouteris repeatedly lied to clients about the status of their settlements, suggesting that he knew he was engaged in deception when cashing the settlement checks."

The appeals judge also said Skouteris’s proposed jury instructions said very little. "Conspicuously, they never mentioned CTE or its effect on his state of mind."

The appeals court ruling also examined and knocked down numerous other claims that Skouteris had raised about his trial and sentence.

For instance, his attorney had argued in a filing that "Mr. Skouteris did not forge the signatures of his clients, but instead signed them pursuant to his authority as their agent."

The appeals court says multiple witnesses testified that they didn't know Skouteris had settled their cases.

"With Skouteris lacking any authority (actual or apparent) to settle his clients’ claims, it is difficult to believe he was authorized to endorse his client’s name on a settlement check the client never knew existed," the appeals ruling said.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons web site says Skouteris is currently incarcerated at FCI Memphis, "a medium security federal correctional institution with an adjacent minimum security satellite camp and a detention center."

The web site shows a scheduled release date in April 2024. Efforts to reach Skouteris' attorney weren't immediately successful Thursday.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Football brain damage claim won't help convicted Memphis lawyer