Citing his “poor and rapidly declining health,” a federal judge sentenced former top malpractice attorney Stephen L. Snyder to three years of probation with six months of home confinement for attempting to extort $25 million from the University of Maryland Medical System.

U.S. District Judge Deborah L. Boardman said the 77-year-old would have likely received prison time for his actions if it was not for his poor medical circumstances, which Snyder said includes a diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease. She noted that he had also lost his law license, was publicly humiliated and spent millions on his defense leaving him essentially broke.

“The bigger you are, the harder you fall,” Snyder told Boardman Wednesday.

For decades, Snyder was considered one of the top plaintiffs’ attorneys in Maryland, winning multiple nine-figure judgments and becoming well known in the area through his television spots that used the tagline: “Don’t just sue them. Snyder them.”

Snyder’s downfall dates back to 2018, when he took on two clients who suffered severe complications following organ transplants and eventually died. Snyder met with hospital officials, telling them he had discovered information about the transplant program that would destroy the hospital and its leaders, showing them television commercials he threatened to release that accused them of putting “profits over safety.”

After his attempt to extract $25 million by demanding to be paid as a consultant, Snyder landed back in court — but this time as the defendant.

Ignoring the pleas of those around him, Snyder chose to represent himself at his jury trial in November. On Wednesday, he admitted that he performed poorly, which even led to a night in prison after Boardman found him in contempt for repeatedly violating her orders.

Prosecutors asked for three years in prison, saying that while the hospital system didn’t pay Snyder what he wanted, they suffered real harm, with the case amplifying Snyder’s accusations about their transplant program.

Boardman said that was one factor in favor of sending Snyder to prison. However, all other factors — such as the risk of re-offending, general deterrence and the need for effective medical care — tipped the scales toward home confinement and probation. She emphasized that this was still a serious sentence.

Self-made power attorney

Snyder grew up in a row house near Reisterstown Road Plaza, sharing one bathroom with two siblings and his parents. He struggled mightily in school before pulling together his classroom performance and eventually graduating from the University of Baltimore School of Law magna cum laude.

C. Justin Brown, his defense attorney, said Snyder was “a self-made man, to a really remarkable degree.” At his father’s Eastern Avenue clothing store, Snyder had discovered a talent for salesmanship, hawking magazine subscriptions to put himself through law school. He wasn’t mentored by the top attorneys or professors, and everything he achieved, he did himself, Brown said. Yet even as he became successful, Snyder felt he still didn’t get the respect he deserved.

He told The Sun in 1999 that he connected with juries because he was a regular guy: “Invariably, juries take a position on me personally. Rarely is it unfavorable.”

Working on contingency rather than hourly fees, his first big civil judgment came in 1983, when he won a $2 million jury verdict against a radiation therapist who overdosed numerous patients. It set him up to start receiving more medical malpractice cases.

In 1990, he won a $106 million settlement in a racial discrimination case against United Cable, then in 1999 a $185 million settlement against Ernst & Young. Three years later, he won a jury verdict against First Union for $276 million. In 2004, he won another case against Ernst & Young, for $125 million.

Over the years he bought a 20,000-square-foot house, drove a Rolls Royce and bought property in Florida. He was also philanthropic, giving millions to his alma mater and to cerebral palsy research, as well as helping out those in need without asking for anything in return, supporters said.

“The only thing bigger than his mouth is his heart,” his second ex-wife, Julia, told Boardman during Wednesday’s sentencing.

But Snyder wanted even more. In 2005, he launched a $1 million ad campaign in search of a billion-dollar case, including full page ads in The Wall Street Journal and New York Times and a website with taglines like “Scoring with the jury, Rolex and all.”

‘‘Why I feel I have to achieve that, I don’t know,” Snyder, then 57, told The Times. “That’s probably something I should talk to my psychiatrist about.‘’

Snyder wanted to be paid and it kept quiet

After the UMMS patients came to him in the late 2010s, Snyder was able to secure $13.5 million in confidential settlements for them — which he argued in his trial was acknowledgment of problems within the hospital program. But he persisted in seeking the $25 million consultancy payment from UMMS.

Snyder took a top hospital official, Dr. Stephen Bartlett, out to dinner at The Capital Grille, where Snyder had the maître d’ hand Bartlett an envelope containing graphic images of a hospital patient and internal hospital documents. Snyder said he wanted to be paid and to keep it quiet.

Red-faced with bloodshot eyes, Snyder repeatedly told Bartlett’s wife, “As long as he does what I want him to do, you’ll be OK,” according to Bartlett, who was the chief medical officer at UMMS.

In conversations secretly recorded by the FBI, Snyder waffled on what exactly he would do to earn the money, saying UMMS could use him as much or as little as it wanted, suggesting a monthly lunch or no contact at all. Snyder said the agreement would also create a conflict that would prevent him from bringing additional cases.

“He took all of the talents, all of the skill, all of the training and trust that you would expect for an attorney, and he distorted it for his own personal gain,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Phelps said in court Wednesday.

Prosecutors initially cleared Snyder of criminal wrongdoing, only to charge him two years later — a fact that enraged Snyder and which he couldn’t help himself from telling jurors even as Boardman repeatedly told him not to.

Snyder told jurors that being aggressive had been his calling card throughout his lucrative career, but insisted that he had no criminal intent and was entrapped by the government.

Hospital officials said they were stunned by Snyder’s pitch, and never wanted to enter into an agreement with him, but kept conversations going out of concern over his threats. Snyder said officials led him on and should have simply let him know they weren’t interested.

“If Maryland didn’t want to do it, that was the end,” Snyder said.

Phelps said Snyder “took all those years of success, talent and clout and said, ’Let me show you how powerful I am.‘”

During jury selection for his trial, Snyder asked Boardman why potential jurors weren’t being asked if they were familiar with his commercials with the “Snyder them” tagline.

The question wasn’t being asked, Boardman said, because Snyder hadn’t requested it during the process in which prosecutors and the defense came up with questions to ask jurors. Snyder had ample opportunity, but simply hadn’t done it.

One of the questions had asked more broadly whether the potential jurors knew who he was. Snyder seemed incredulous that anyone would say no.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked juror after juror who had already checked “no” on the questionnaire. No, they replied.

At one point during testimony, he complained about something without mounting an objection. “Just say objection. Just say objection,” his standby counsel, Gerald Ruter, told him. Snyder did not object.

During his closing argument, Snyder rambled before being cut off by Boardman.

Phelps, the prosecutor, contended Wednesday that Snyder admirably held his own while representing himself during the two-week trial, even saying “every bit of it was vintage Steve Snyder.”

But those who had observed him for years knew that was far from true. Brown, the defense attorney representing Snyder at sentencing, said it was a “tragedy” that Snyder had represented himself. He said Snyder failed to enter evidence that could’ve changed the trajectory of the case, and similarly failed to block evidence from the government that another attorney might have been able to exclude. Outside of courtroom, he fell inside of a bathroom stall.

“I read the transcripts — it’s painful,” Brown said.

Wearing a pinstripe suit and moving slowly on Wednesday, Snyder said his physical and mental health were so poor that he wouldn’t be able to contribute to making sure prison officials provided him a proper regimen.

“To this day I don’t want to admit I have Parkinson’s,” he said. “It doesn’t make me feel good.” He said he uses a cane and walker, but never showed up to court using them — including Wednesday — because he was “too vain.”

Snyder apologized to Boardman for his conduct during trial and said that since then he had been “agonizing each and every day for my poor behavior and my precipitous fall from grace.”

“I was my own worst enemy,” he said.