California IN BRIEF : NEWPORT BEACH : Attorney Convicted in Blood Test Plot

An attorney was convicted of conspiracy, perjury and falsifying documents for sending an impostor to take a blood test for a paternity suit. William Yacobozzi Jr. faces four years in prison and loss of his law license. He is scheduled to be sentenced March 6. Yacobozzi maintains his innocence. Coleen Walters, a former client of Yacobozzi’s, testified that he was the father of her 6-year-old son. Yacobozzi, a criminal-defense lawyer, claimed he never had sex with Walters and described her as a disgruntled client who blamed him for her $60,000 tax bill. An early blood test showed a 99.3% chance that he is the boy’s father, prosecutors said. But Yacobozzi requested that a DNA test and another blood test be performed. He claimed that he went to a Long Beach clinic to take the second blood test. Prosecutors said the man who took the test was an impostor, and the jury was convinced.