Opri: Birkhead Knows He's Gonna Lose

Debra Opri admits that she's in possession of money that a TV network paid to Larry Birkhead—and Birkhead knows it, she says.

In an opposition to Birkhead's motion for a preliminary injunction to keep Opri from getting to the cash he says rightly belongs to him, the Los Angeles-based attorney called her former client's petition "completely without merit and entirely frivolous."

Per court documents filed June 28 in Los Angeles Superior Court and obtained by E! News, Opri contends that Birkhead knows darn well that the majority of the $1 million paid him by NBC Universal in the midst of the Anna Nicole Smith baby daddy battle is currently in Birkhead's client trust account.

He knew ahead of time that he wouldn't be getting the rest of his paycheck until he settled up with her, Opri states. (View Opri's complete filing.)

Birkhead has sued Opri for fraud and legal malpractice, claiming that he has only received $200,000 of his seven-figure payday, that she deposited the rest of his money into her accounts without his permission, and that his erstwhile family attorney—whom he fired before DNA finally proved he was Dannielynn's biological father—racked up an invoice full of bogus expenses, such as expensive dinners with friends, that she expects him to pay.

Opri, meanwhile, has moved for court-ordered arbitration to settle the matter of Birkhead's allegedly outstanding $650,000 bill, comprising six months and hundreds of hours of work.

In a separate objection, also filed June 28, Opri states that, contrary to what Birkhead has said, she never told him that she would represent him "free of charge," calling his words "an inflammatory and misleading falsehood." (Birkhead alleges that Opri induced him to meet with her in the first place by suggesting she would represent him for free in exchange for all the publicity she would inevitably reap.)

Also included with her filing was a declaration made by bodyguard Mark Speer, who claims in court documents that he heard Opri and Birkhead discuss the $1 million paycheck and that Birkhead "clearly understood that this money was going to pay some or all of his current legal bills relating to his case with Debra."

"Birkhead's only concern and perhaps his most telling 'fear' is that he actually understands and has already concluded that he will, in all likelihood, lose the arbitration (perhaps that is why he is so adamant against it going forward) and will then have to pay Opri for her services rendered," Opri's objection to the injunction states.

She has "repeatedly advised" Birkhead that his money would remain in his client trust account until their bill was settled, Opri says, also claiming that Birkhead, as of March, had only paid his Bahamian attorney, Alexiou Knowles, a fraction of what he owed him, as well.

Besides, before Opri helped Birkhead secure the NBC deal, she states, he had only paid her $20,000, had advised her that he couldn't pay any more for the time being, and pleaded with her to stay on as his counsel. (The TV deal came after Smith's death in February.)

Birkhead fired back Monday, meanwhile, with a court filing stating that Opri hasn't proved that she still has the aforementioned funds in the client trust account. One of her attorneys "has merely attached a few hearsay letters.

A highly itemized bill, breaking all of Opri's charges down into minute increments, from September 2006, during which Speer allegedly overhead Opri and Birkhead talking shop, proves that the security guard heard no such thing (because, otherwise, the bill would state when Speer was present), Birkhead alleges. (The 40-page bill totaling $122,953.75 in fees was also filed.)

Birkhead says that his request to see a copy of a bank statement proving that the money is still there has been denied, and that "no competent evidence" has been presented concerning the money's whereabouts.

Basically, Birkhead reasserts that he never authorized Opri to deposit the media deal money.

"She has no right to hold it," he says.

TMZ.com reported last week that Birkhead filed a complaint against Opri with the State Bar of California on June 8 as part of his ongoing efforts to collect what he feels is rightly his.

The association cannot confirm that a complaint has been filed, however, until a panel of attorneys has reviewed it and concluded that there is enough evidence to file a notice of disciplinary charges.