When I first wrote about the use of collateral estoppel in attorney discipline proceedings 17 years ago,1 most disciplinary and grievance committees had not applied the doctrine except to establish liability in criminal conviction cases or to impose reciprocal discipline based upon discipline in a foreign jurisdiction. The idea of applying collateral estoppel to a … Read more
The trend toward leniency in Second Department escrow fund misappropriation cases, which I identified in a previous column,1 continued in Matter of Francis.2 In the Francis case, the respondent Marc A. Francis admitted that he received $10,000 in a fiduciary capacity on behalf of a client, but then drew approximately 14 checks and made additional transfers against … Read more
In a recently published law review article, “Lowering the Bar: How Lawyer Discipline in New York Fails to Protect the Public,”1 Stephen Gillers examines attorney discipline through the prism of 577 published disciplinary opinions that he painstakingly reviewed. Gillers’ conclusions and observations are assuredly troubling for a regulatory system that presumably exists to protect clients and … Read more
Attorneys who bully or neglect their clients, steal from escrow accounts, overbill, lie to authorities and generally ignore the Code of Professional Responsibility have been the focus of Hal R. Lieberman’s practice for more than 25 years. Mr. Lieberman honed his skills in the legal ethics and professional liability field as assistant bar counsel in … Read more
Small Firms and Solos Are Often Subject to Disciplinary Complaints and Malpractice Claims Every year literally thousands of New York attorneys are recipients of client disciplinary complaints, and many are also sued for malpractice. The vast majority of these respondents (to use the disciplinary parlance) are small firm and solo practitioners. Even more ominously, the numbers … Read more
Attorney Joseph Masterson married Mary Masterson in 1956. Forty-one years later, he purportedly married Mingli Yang without divorcing his first wife. At the time of his second wedding, Mr. Masterson submitted an application to the city clerk falsely affirming he had never been married. The Appellate Division, Second Department, determined that Masterson had engaged in … Read more