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NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – A motion filed in criminal court Thursday (Dec. 4) accuses New Orleans defense attorney Tanzanika Ruffin of defrauding her client and his family out of at least $250,000.<\/p>\n
The payments sent by a New York family to Ruffin included $66,000 in April, nearly $13,000 in June, $90,000 in September and more than $100,000 in October.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re looking at a sizable sum of money,\u201d said Rafael Goyeneche, Metropolitan Crime Commission president.<\/p>\n
In a motion to clarify a plea deal in defendant Kai Hansen\u2019s case, prosecutors with the Orleans Parish District Attorney\u2019s Office allege Ruffin defrauded Hansen\u2019s family and that the payments they sent were for legal matters that didn\u2019t exist.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere probably is not a greater violation of that trust than attorney-client privilege,\u201d Goyeneche said.<\/p>\n
Hansen allegedly battered a police officer on Bourbon Street in March. He was arrested, and his family contracted Ruffin. In the magistrate court, Hansen\u2019s bond was set at $8,000, but Ruffin asked for $66,000 in bond money and then received an additional $12,500 for what she called an added criminal charge. The District Attorney\u2019s Office said in its motion that the defendant was never faced with that charge.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf these allegations are correct, it\u2019s an embarrassment for the entire profession,\u201d said FOX 8 legal analyst Joe Raspanti.<\/p>\n
Hansen\u2019s family alleges in court records that Ruffin said $250,000 in restitution would be required to settle his case, a factor the District Attorney\u2019s Office says was never discussed.<\/p>\n
When the family asked Ruffin to clarify, she said the number was instead a settlement, which prosecutors say in their motion Ruffin fabricated.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s something that gives the legal profession a black eye,\u201d Goyeneche said.<\/p>\n
Goyeneche says his office investigated Ruffin before. He pointed to a 2004 case in which Ruffin couldn\u2019t practice law for 30 days, and the District Attorney\u2019s Office fired her after the bar association found she threatened to arrest someone for not paying a handyman for his unfinished job.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, we\u2019re in 2025, and we\u2019re looking at her allegedly defrauding her client out of over $250,000\u2026 that\u2019s shocking,\u201d Goyeneche said.<\/p>\n
Raspanti says Ruffin can expect consequences.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, I think she should be concerned about criminal charges and Louisiana state bar disciplinary charges from them. She\u2019s got a lot of problems if this is correct,\u201d Raspanti said.<\/p>\n
Ruffin and her representatives declined to comment on the allegations against her.<\/p>\n
See a spelling or grammar error in our story? <\/i>Click Here<\/i><\/a> to report it. Please include the headline.<\/i><\/p>\n Subscribe to the Fox 8 <\/i>YouTube channel<\/i><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n Copyright 2025 WVUE. All rights reserved.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) – A motion filed in criminal court Thursday (Dec. 4) accuses New Orleans defense attorney Tanzanika Ruffin of defrauding her client and his family out of at least $250,000. The payments sent by a New York family to Ruffin included $66,000 in April, nearly $13,000 in June, $90,000 in September and more … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12352,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/New-Orleans-defense-attorney-accused-of-defrauding-clients-family-out.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12351"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12353,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12351\/revisions\/12353"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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