The King Firm lawsuit refers to the federal criminal case against the New Orleans personal injury firm The King Firm LLC and its lead attorney, Jason Giles, who were convicted in March 2026 of orchestrating staged 18-wheeler crashes to extract insurance settlements. A jury in the Eastern District of Louisiana found Giles and the firm guilty of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, mail fraud, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering. The case is part of “Operation Sideswipe,” an FBI investigation that has charged 63 people and produced more than 50 guilty pleas or convictions.
What The King Firm Was Accused of Doing
Prosecutors said the scheme ran from roughly December 2011 through December 2024 and relied on deliberately crashing passenger vehicles into tractor-trailers on highways around New Orleans, particularly in New Orleans East and Gentilly near truck stops. The operation used a hierarchy of participants: attorneys who funded and directed it, “runners” who recruited passengers, “slammers” who drove into the trucks on purpose, and “spotters” who posed as independent witnesses at the scene to back up false police reports.
Recruited passengers were steered to specific firms, including The King Firm and the Motta Law Firm, which then sent them to a network of cooperating doctors to generate injury documentation. Some participants were pushed into unnecessary surgeries to inflate claim values. Attorneys coached participants in firm conference rooms to keep their stories aligned.
Participants used coded language. “Going fishing” meant staging a wreck. “Bread” was money, “fish” were clients, and a “spoiled product” was a police report that didn’t help the claim. Cash payments to runners and slammers sometimes arrived wrapped in newspaper; checks were disguised as “client advances” or “advertising.” Damian Labeaud, a central cooperator, testified that he earned as much as $15,000 per week coordinating crashes for The King Firm and other attorneys, and that Giles kept “thousands” of dollars in cash at his office and paid $1,000 per passenger recruited into a staged wreck.
Defense lawyers for trucking companies estimated there were “well over 200 documented” staged accidents, with insurance payouts topping $50 million.
The Federal Trial and Verdict
The trial opened in early March 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana before Judge Wendy Vitter. The defendants were Giles, Vanessa Motta, their respective firms, and Diamanike Stalbert, an associate accused of lying to federal agents.
Over three weeks, prosecutors presented evidence that Giles and Motta had paid slammers to stage collisions and then filed fraudulent lawsuits to collect settlements. They also presented evidence that after learning of the FBI investigation, Giles secretly recorded a charged individual in October 2020 to try to manufacture exculpatory evidence, and that Motta and co-defendant Sean Alfortish tried to pay a cooperating witness, Cornelius Garrison, to leave the country before Garrison was killed. First Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Simpson described the attorneys’ conduct as “the worst of the worst of what lawyers can be.”
On March 20, 2026, the jury returned guilty verdicts on all counts against Giles, Motta, and both law firms. Giles and The King Firm LLC were convicted of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, mail fraud, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering. Motta and Motta Law LLC were convicted of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, multiple counts of mail fraud, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering. Stalbert was found guilty of making false statements to federal agents but acquitted of the main conspiracy charge.
Judge Vitter immediately ordered Giles and Motta remanded to federal custody, citing evidence of witness interference and bond violations. Both attorneys face a maximum of 20 years in federal prison on the most serious counts. Stalbert was released with conditions and faces up to five years. Legal analyst Joe Raspanti estimated that Giles and Motta each face between seven and twelve years at sentencing, and said monetary penalties against the firms could force both to shut down permanently.
The Murder of a Cooperating Witness
The prosecution is tied to a killing. Cornelius Garrison III, a slammer who had been secretly cooperating with the FBI since October 2019, was shot and killed at his mother’s home in New Orleans on September 22, 2020, four days after he was indicted for his own role in the scheme. Prosecutors believe his cooperation was discovered by others in the ring.
Federal authorities allege that Sean Alfortish, a disbarred attorney and Motta’s fiancé, paid Leon “Chunky” Parker to carry out the killing. Ryan “Red” Harris, another slammer who testified he staged more than 80 crashes, admitted to introducing Alfortish to Parker and later helping destroy a getaway car. Harris pleaded guilty in January 2025 to causing Garrison’s death through the use of a firearm, along with conspiracy and wire fraud charges, and agreed to a 35-year sentence in exchange for cooperation.
Alfortish and Parker were indicted in April 2025 on charges including conspiracy to commit witness tampering through murder, witness tampering through murder, conspiracy to retaliate against a witness, retaliation against a witness, and causing death through the use of a firearm. They face a maximum of life in prison if convicted. Their trial is set for August 2026 before Judge Vitter. The King Firm and Giles were not charged in Garrison’s death.
What Happens Next
Sentencing is staggered over three weeks in July 2026: Motta and Motta Law on July 7, Giles and The King Firm on July 14, and Stalbert on July 21.
Motta has already moved for a new trial. Her attorney, Sean Toomey, filed a motion arguing that prosecutors made “repeated threats” to introduce evidence linking Motta to Garrison’s murder, which Toomey said “crippled Ms. Motta’s ability to defend herself.” The motion also challenges the jury instructions on the witness tampering count and claims that closing arguments by Giles’s attorney were prejudicial to Motta. Toomey has signaled an appeal to the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. As of early April 2026, no other defendants had filed similar motions.
On the professional discipline side, the Louisiana Supreme Court suspended Giles’s law license in December 2024 and authorized the Office of Disciplinary Counsel to appoint a trustee to protect his clients. Both Giles’s and Motta’s licenses remain suspended. The state bar’s disciplinary process operates independently of the federal prosecution, and other attorneys at The King Firm could face their own disciplinary investigations regardless of whether formal complaints are filed.
Judge Vitter has indicated that a second trial addressing additional witness tampering charges will also take place in August 2026, alongside the Alfortish and Parker murder trial.