Lawyers for Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen accuse each other of 'reckless, malicious' leaks

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Lawyers for Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney and an adult film star suing the president have both accused each other of leaking damaging information in an increasingly ugly legal battle over a 2016 nondisclosure agreement.

The two lawyers faced off in a court hearing over materials seized from Mr Trump's attorney, Michael Cohen, in FBI raids last month. Michael Avenatti, the California-based attorney for adult film actress Stormy Daniels, was arguing for the right to participate in the New York court case.

In increasingly tense exchanges, Mr Cohen’s attorney accused Mr Avenatti of conducting a “drive by shooting of [his] client’s rights,” while Mr Avenatti accused Mr Cohen of leaking secret recordings he compared to the Nixon tapes.

Mr Avenatti eventually elected to drop his motion rather than stop his “publicity tour," as Judge Kimba Wood called his numerous interviews on the case. The motion was dropped without prejudice, meaning Mr Avenatti could pick it up later.

But Ms Wood also gave Mr Cohen a tough deadline under which to review the documents seized by the FBI for attorney-client privilege. Mr Cohen’s attorney, Stephen Ryan, claimed attorneys were sleeping on couches to review the 3.7m files in time.

The documents were seized as part of a federal investigation into Mr Cohen’s business practices. The attorney has not been charged.

Mr Avenatti is representing Ms Daniels in her suit against Mr Cohen and Mr Trump, in an attempt to invalidate a nondisclosure agreement she says was meant to keep her silent about her affair with the president. Mr Trump has denied the affair occurred.

In court on Wednesday, Mr Ryan accused Mr Avenatti of leaking his client’s private bank records to the press. Mr Avenatti published documents earlier this month showing Mr Cohen had been paid by companies such as AT&T and Novartis for consulting work after Mr Trump’s election. The documents appeared to be "suspicious activity reports” sent to Mr Cohen’s bank, which Mr Ryan said were only accessible through his client’s private records.

"I've never seen an attorney conduct himself the way Mr Avenatti conducted himself," Mr Ryan said, according to CNBC. "What Mr Avenatti did in releasing those records was entirely improper.”

But Mr Avenatti shot back, accusing Mr Ryan of leaking tapes of private conversations between Ms Daniels and her former lawyer, Keith Davidson. Mr Avenatti said he had been contacted by a reporter enquiring about the conversations, which he said concerned the 2016 nondisclosure agreement.

Mr Ryan appeared to acknowledge the existence of the tapes, but said they were kept "under lock and key,” according to CNN.

Mr Avenatti seized on the apparent admission, telling reporters: "It is clear from today's proceedings that Mr Cohen and his attorneys are hell-bent on continuing to hide the truth from the American people."

“As a result of our efforts there was a shocking admission in court today – namely that just like the Nixon tapes years ago, we now have what I will refer to as the 'Trump Tapes’,” he added.

Mr Avenatti eventually backed down after Ms Kimba ordered him to drop his motion or "stop [his] publicity tour”. The lawyer has made 170 media appearances in recent months – behaviour Ms Kimba called “inimitable to giving Mr Cohen eventually a fair trial”.

The judge also ordered Mr Cohen’s team to complete their review of the seized documents by 15 June. Any remaining documents, she said, would be reviewed by a team of government lawyers known as a “taint team”.