Case Title: Disciplinary Counsel v. Wise

Citation: 2006-Ohio-1194

Docket Number: 20051182

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2006-03-29T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. Wise, 108 Ohio St.3d 381, 2006-Ohio-1194.] 
 
 
DISCIPLINARY COUNSEL v. WISE. 
[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. Wise, 108 Ohio St.3d 381, 2006-Ohio-1194.] 
Attorneys at law — Misconduct — Conduct prejudicial to the administration of 
justice — Conduct adversely reflecting on fitness to practice law — 
Commingling — Failure to maintain records and accounts — Indefinite 
suspension. 
(No. 2005-1182 — Submitted November 30, 2005 — Decided March 29, 2006.) 
ON CERTIFIED REPORT by the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 
Discipline of the Supreme Court, No. 04-043. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} Respondent, David Michael Wise of Cleveland, Ohio, Attorney 
Registration No. 0037837, was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1987.  On February 
22, 2006, in a case unrelated to this one, we suspended him from the practice of 
law for one year, with the last six months stayed, for violating DR 7-102(A)(1) 
(prohibiting a lawyer from acting merely to harass another during representation), 
7-105(A) (barring a lawyer from threatening to pursue criminal charges solely to 
obtain advantage in a civil matter), and 9-101(C) (prohibiting a lawyer from 
stating or implying the ability to influence improperly a tribunal, legislative body, 
or public official).  Cuyahoga Cty. Bar Assn. v. Wise, 108 Ohio St.3d 164, 2006-
Ohio-550, 842 N.E.2d 35. 
{¶ 2} In connection with the allegations before us in this case, relator – 
Disciplinary Counsel – filed a complaint on August 9, 2004, charging respondent 
with professional misconduct.  Respondent filed an answer to the complaint, and a 
panel of the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline held a hearing 
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on the complaint in March 2005.  The panel then prepared written findings of fact, 
conclusions of law, and a recommendation, all of which the board adopted. 
Misconduct 
{¶ 3} Respondent — who practiced law in Cleveland — maintained an 
account into which he deposited fees from clients, personal funds, and cash 
between 2002 and 2004.  In establishing the account, he had designated it as an 
IOLTA (interest on lawyers’ trust accounts) account.  Respondent also transferred 
money from his business account into the IOLTA account. 
{¶ 4} Respondent testified at his disciplinary hearing that he had no 
client ledgers, records, or receipts showing the source of some of the funds 
deposited into the IOLTA account.  He also stated that he might have loaned 
money in the IOLTA account to others, but he had no records documenting the 
loans or any repayments. 
{¶ 5} Respondent paid personal obligations and funded personal 
accounts from the money in his IOLTA account.  He wrote checks from the trust 
account totaling over $23,000 payable to his wife, as well as checks to Hometown 
Buffet, Lowe’s, Federal Express, and Auto Zone. 
{¶ 6} On several occasions between 2002 and 2004, respondent 
overdrew his IOLTA account, creating a negative balance in the account.  He was 
charged overdraft fees for bounced checks twice in 2002, 12 times in 2003, and 
five times in 2004. 
{¶ 7} Respondent acknowledged at his disciplinary hearing before the 
panel that he had “misused” his IOLTA account by treating it “as though it were 
just a regular office account.”  But he denied that there were ever any client funds 
in the account.  Although the source of much of the money in the account was 
attorney fees, he testified that the fees had all been earned before they were paid 
and that the account had never held unearned retainers or other funds of clients. 
January Term, 2006 
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{¶ 8} The board found that respondent had violated DR 1-102(A)(5) 
(barring conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice), 1-102(A)(6) (barring 
conduct that adversely reflects on a lawyer’s fitness to practice law), 9-102(A) 
(requiring lawyers to maintain client funds in a separate, identifiable bank 
account), and 9-102(B)(3) (requiring lawyers to maintain complete records of all 
client funds and to render appropriate accounts regarding them).  The case is now 
before us on respondent’s objections to the board’s findings of fact, conclusions 
of law, and recommendation. 
{¶ 9} Respondent argues in his objections that relator “failed to establish 
who the funds deposited into the IOLTA account were obtained from or for what 
purposes they were tendered.”  Yet it is he who designated the account as a trust 
account when he established it, giving rise to the inference that it would hold 
client funds.  If he now claims that it held only his funds, never client funds, he is 
the one who should present evidence to support the claim.  He is the only one 
whose billing records could prove his claim that all fees were earned before they 
were deposited.  He provided no such records for his IOLTA account during the 
disciplinary process. 
{¶ 10} And respondent was hardly forthcoming with information about 
his IOLTA account.  When relator first inquired about the negative balance in the 
account, respondent claimed in a letter that his “records indicated a positive 
balance of several thousand dollars” in the trust account.  Relator then asked to 
see those records in February 2004, but respondent did not reply, prompting 
relator to issue a subpoena duces tecum for the records.  Respondent never 
produced any records reflecting a positive balance in the account for the time 
periods when the bank records showed that the trust account was overdrawn.  
Even so, at his disciplinary hearing he stated, “I produced all the material that you 
asked me for.”  When pressed again by relator at that hearing to produce the 
records showing a positive balance in the account, he finally acknowledged, 
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“There is no record per se showing a positive balance in my IOLTA.”  His initial 
claim that such records did exist was not candid, and his delays and equivocations 
raise concerns for us about his integrity. 
{¶ 11} When questioned at his disciplinary hearing about the source of the 
money in the account, respondent insisted, “[I]t’s my money. * * * I know that 
it’s my money.”  Yet he also acknowledged at the hearing that the account was 
indeed an IOLTA account rather than an ordinary business account for his law 
practice, and the exhibits introduced at respondent’s disciplinary hearing show 
that at least some of the money deposited into the account represented legal fees 
paid by clients.  One of the checks had the notation “Retainer” on the memo line.  
Moreover, in a letter to relator in January 2004, respondent stated that some of the 
money in the account belonged to a person for whom he had a power of attorney.  
In view of this evidence, respondent’s evasiveness, and his designation of the 
account as an IOLTA account, we do not credit his conclusory testimony that no 
funds of clients were ever in the account.  Respondent therefore should not have 
deposited his own funds into the account, for as we have said, “Canon 9 of our 
Code of Professional Responsibility requires the separation of client funds from 
those of the lawyer, not only to protect the client, but also to avoid even the 
appearance of impropriety.”  Erie-Huron Counties Joint Certified Grievance 
Commt. v. Miles (1996), 76 Ohio St.3d 574, 576, 669 N.E.2d 831. 
Sanction 
{¶ 12} In recommending a sanction for this misconduct, the board 
considered the aggravating and mitigating factors listed in Section 10 of the Rules 
and Regulations Governing Procedure on Complaints and Hearings Before the 
Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline (“BCGD Proc.Reg.”).  As 
an aggravating factor, the board found that respondent had been charged with 
committing prior disciplinary offenses (and we have now imposed the suspension 
noted above for those offenses).  The board also found that respondent failed to 
January Term, 2006 
5 
 
cooperate in the disciplinary process, provided evasive testimony during that 
process, and lacked a sense of responsibility and remorse for his misconduct.  
BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(1)(a), (e), (f), and (g).  Those factors “do not bode well 
for his rehabilitation,” according to the panel that heard and saw respondent 
testify. 
{¶ 13} In mitigation, the board noted that no evidence suggests that 
anyone lost money as a result of respondent’s mismanagement of his IOLTA 
account. 
{¶ 14} Relator recommended that respondent be suspended from the 
practice of law for one year with six months of the suspension stayed.  The panel 
agreed with that recommendation, as did the full board.  We have reviewed the 
board’s report, and have also considered the written and oral arguments presented 
by the parties in response to that report.  We find that respondent violated all of 
the provisions cited in the board’s report, but we disagree with the board’s 
recommended sanction.  The appropriate sanction in this case is an indefinite 
suspension. 
{¶ 15} Ten years ago, we stated that it is “of the utmost importance that 
attorneys maintain their personal and office accounts separate from their clients’ 
accounts” and that any violation of that rule “warrants a substantial sanction 
whether or not the client has been harmed.”  Miles, 76 Ohio St.3d at 577, 669 
N.E.2d 831.  And in an earlier case, we explained that the “mishandling of clients’ 
funds either by way of conversion, commingling, or just poor management, 
encompasses an area of the gravest concern of this court in reviewing claimed 
attorney misconduct.”  Columbus Bar Assn. v. Thompson (1982), 69 Ohio St.2d 
667, 669, 23 O.O.3d 541, 433 N.E.2d 602. 
{¶ 16} Respondent’s extended misuse of his client trust account between 
2002 and 2004, his failure to maintain or produce adequate records documenting 
account deposits and withdrawals, his multiple overdrafts from the trust account, 
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and his lack of cooperation and candor during the disciplinary investigation point 
toward the need for a suspension to protect the public.  And in light of 
respondent’s very recent suspension for additional and unrelated ethical 
violations, see Cuyahoga Cty. Bar Assn. v. Wise, 108 Ohio St.3d 164, 2006-Ohio-
550, 842 N.E.2d 35, we find that an indefinite suspension is warranted for this 
latest misconduct. 
{¶ 17} Accordingly, respondent is hereby indefinitely suspended from the 
practice of law in Ohio.  Costs are taxed to respondent. 
Judgment accordingly. 
 
MOYER, C.J., RESNICK, LUNDBERG STRATTON and O’CONNOR, JJ., concur. 
 
PFEIFER, O’DONNELL and LANZINGER, JJ., dissent and would suspend 
respondent for 12 months, with six months stayed. 
__________________ 
 
Jonathan E. Coughlan, Disciplinary Counsel, and Lori J. Brown, First 
Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, for relator. 
 
David M. Wise, pro se. 
______________________