Bernie Kerik suffered a setback Thursday in a dragged-out defamation case filed against him by his former lawyer when a federal judge tossed out the ex-police commissioner’s own claims that celebrity attorney Joe Tacopina had defamed him.
Kerik and Tacopina have been trading barbs in Manhattan federal suits that stem from Kerik’s 2009 guilty plea to charges of tax fraud and lying.
Tacopina initially sued Kerik in 2014 for allegedly defaming him in a disciplinary complaint — by claiming Tacopina had disclosed privileged attorney-client information to the feds.
Kerik countersued, denying he ever made those allegations in the complaint.
But in a decision Thursday, Judge Laura Swain dismissed Kerik’s counterclaims.
She wasn’t convinced that Tacopina filed “multiple sham lawsuits against him in order to defame him” and that his new political-commentator career suffered.
Tacopina’s lawyer, Judd Burstein, said he wasn’t surprised by the ruling. Tim Parlatore, who reps Kerik, said he was eager to move forward.