Case Title: Toledo Bar Assn. v. Stahlbush

Citation: 2010-Ohio-3823

Docket Number: 20100032

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2010-08-24T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as 
Toledo Bar Assn. v. Stahlbush, Slip Opinion No. 2010-Ohio-3823.] 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in 
an advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested 
to promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 
65 South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or 
other formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be 
made before the opinion is published. 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2010-OHIO-3823 
TOLEDO BAR ASSOCIATION v. STAHLBUSH. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as Toledo Bar Assn. v. Stahlbush,  
Slip Opinion No. 2010-Ohio-3823.] 
Attorneys at law — Misconduct — Two-year license suspension with one year 
stayed on conditions. 
(No. 2010-0032 — Submitted March 30, 2010 — Decided August 24, 2010.) 
ON CERTIFIED REPORT by the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 
Discipline of the Supreme Court, No. 08-059. 
__________________ 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} Respondent, Kristin Ann Stahlbush of Toledo, Ohio, Attorney 
Registration No. 0064019, was admitted to the practice of law in Ohio in 1994.  In 
August 2008, relator, Toledo Bar Association, filed a complaint charging her with 
violations of the Code of Professional Responsibility and the Ohio Rules of 
Professional Conduct for inflating the billable hours for work she performed as a 
court-appointed attorney in the juvenile and general division courts in Lucas 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
2 
 
County.  Based upon findings that respondent committed multiple violations of 
the ethical standards incumbent upon Ohio lawyers, the board recommends that 
we suspend respondent’s license to practice law in Ohio for two years, with one 
year stayed on conditions.  For the reasons that follow, we accept the board’s 
recommendation. 
Misconduct 
{¶ 2} Respondent, a solo practitioner in Toledo, Ohio, limited her 
practice primarily to court-appointed work in the juvenile and general divisions of 
the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas.  In early 2007, court personnel 
discovered that respondent’s billings in the juvenile court were very high and that 
she had billed the juvenile court for more than 24 hours per day on at least three 
occasions, and more than 20 hours per day on five other occasions, in 2006.  
Further investigation revealed that on numerous additional occasions, respondent 
had billed the court for work in excess of 14 and up to 19 hours per day.  When 
respondent failed to provide documentation to support the hours she billed, the 
juvenile court’s administrative judge referred the matter to relator.  After 
conducting an investigation, relator filed a five-count complaint alleging that 
respondent’s conduct violated 1-102(A)(4) (prohibiting conduct involving  
dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation), 1-102(A)(5) (prohibiting conduct 
prejudicial to the administration of justice), 1-102(A)(6) (prohibiting conduct that 
adversely reflects on a lawyer’s fitness to practice law), DR 2-106(A) (prohibiting 
a lawyer from charging an excessive fee), and Prof.Cond.R. 8.1(B) (requiring a 
lawyer’s cooperation with disciplinary authority).1 
{¶ 3} On the third day of the hearing before a panel of the Board of 
Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline, the parties submitted stipulations 
                                                 
1.  Relator charged respondent with misconduct pursuant to applicable rules for acts occurring 
before and after February 1, 2007, the effective date of the Rules of Professional Conduct, which 
superseded the Code of Professional Responsibility. 
 
January Term, 2010 
3 
 
that the respondent had billed the county for 3451.4 hours for appointed-counsel 
services in 2006, that a portion of the time she billed was false and fraudulent, and 
that her conduct violated DR 1-102(A)(4), 1-102(A)(5), 1-102(A)(6), and 2-
106(A).  The panel accepted these stipulations and found that in addition to billing 
more than 24 hours in a day, respondent’s submissions to the court also aver that 
she worked 14 to 24 hours on numerous occasions.  In one 96-hour period, 
respondent billed 90.3 hours, and in a separate 144-hour period, she billed 139.5 
hours.  Additionally, the board found that respondent admitted that she had double 
billed the general division of the court for work she performed in a capital case 
and that she had returned the unearned portion of those fees. 
{¶ 4} Based upon the parties’ stipulations and its own factual findings, 
the panel and board concluded, and we agree, that respondent’s conduct violated 
DR 1-102(A)(4), 1-102(A)(5), 1-102(A)(6), and 2-106(A). 
{¶ 5} The parties did not stipulate, and the panel and the board made no 
finding, regarding the allegation that respondent violated Prof.Cond.R. 8.1(b).  
However, in light of relator’s apparent abandonment of the claim and 
respondent’s eventual cooperation with the disciplinary process, we hereby 
dismiss Count Five of relator’s complaint. 
Sanction 
{¶ 6} When imposing sanctions for attorney misconduct, we consider 
relevant factors, including the ethical duties that the lawyer violated and the 
sanctions imposed in similar cases.  Stark Cty. Bar Assn. v. Buttacavoli, 96 Ohio 
St.3d 424, 2002-Ohio-4743, 775 N.E.2d 818, ¶ 16.  In making a final 
determination, we also weigh evidence of the aggravating and mitigating factors 
listed in Section 10(B) of the Rules and Regulations Governing Procedure on 
Complaints and Hearings Before the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 
Discipline (“BCGD Proc.Reg.”).  Disciplinary Counsel v. Broeren, 115 Ohio 
St.3d 473, 2007-Ohio-5251, 875 N.E.2d 935, ¶ 21. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
4 
 
{¶ 7} The board found that three of the nine aggravating factors set forth 
in BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(1) are present, including a dishonest or selfish motive, 
a pattern of misconduct, and  multiple offenses.  BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(1)(b), 
(c), and (d). 
{¶ 8} In mitigation, the board found that respondent has no prior 
disciplinary record and that she is known by clients, peers, judges, and 
magistrates as a competent, hard-working attorney who represents her clients 
zealously.  BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(2)(a) and (e).  The board also noted that 
respondent has made restitution to the general division of the common pleas court 
for the double billing in one case, has agreed to forgo any claim for the $12,000 in 
attorney-fee applications that she submitted to the court in 2007, and has been 
denied court appointments in the juvenile court, her primary source of income.  
See BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(2)(f). 
{¶ 9} Relator sought a one-year suspension of respondent’s license to 
practice law, with six months stayed.  Respondent, in contrast, argued for a two-
year suspension, but urged that the entire suspension be stayed.  After considering 
respondent’s conduct, the aggravating and mitigating factors, and the sanctions 
imposed by this court in Disciplinary Counsel v. Agopian, 112 Ohio St.3d 103, 
2006-Ohio-6510, 858 N.E.2d 368; Disciplinary Counsel v. Holland, 106 Ohio 
St.3d 372, 2005-Ohio-5322, 835 N.E.2d 361; and Disciplinary Counsel v. Rohrer, 
124 Ohio St.3d 65, 2009-Ohio-5930, 919 N.E.2d 180, the panel and board now 
recommend that we impose a two-year license suspension with one year stayed on 
the conditions that respondent submit to a one-year monitored probation and 
commit no further ethical violations.  Respondent objects to the recommended 
sanction, arguing that it is excessive in light of the facts and the case law cited by 
the board. 
{¶ 10} In Agopian, the respondent had submitted fee requests for work 
performed in excess of 24 hours on three separate days.  Agopian, 112 Ohio St.3d 
January Term, 2010 
5 
 
103, 2006-Ohio-6510, 858 N.E.2d 368, ¶ 6.  The record demonstrated that the 
respondent had performed all the work he claimed in each case, but that he had 
failed to accurately record the dates he appeared in court or the specific number of 
hours he had spent on those cases.  Id.  Nonetheless, there was no evidence that 
respondent had attempted to collect fees for work he did not perform.  Id.  Rather, 
the evidence demonstrated that the respondent had “routinely perform[ed] 
services in an amount far in excess of the time for which he submit[ted] payment 
requests.”  Id.  Instead of “taking one hour * * * and turning it into three,” it 
appeared that he “was taking three hours and turning it into one.”  (Ellipsis sic.)  
Id.  Therefore, we concluded that a public reprimand was the appropriate sanction 
in that case.  Id. at ¶ 15. 
{¶ 11} Respondent equates her “sloppy record-keeping” to the billing 
errors committed by the respondent in Agopian.  The evidence, however, 
demonstrates that not only did she fail to keep adequate records of the hours she 
worked on behalf of her clients, but she also submitted fee requests that 
deceptively inflated the hours she worked, and that in some instances, she merely 
guessed at the time she had spent on a case.  Viewed in isolation, her fee requests 
did not appear unreasonable to the judges and officials charged with reviewing 
them, but viewed in a continuum, they were simply incredible. 
{¶ 12} When confronted with the excessiveness of her fee requests, 
respondent initially maintained that she had worked every hour that she had 
billed.  She eventually admitted that she could have made some mistakes in her 
billing, that she had failed to keep accurate time records, and that if her billing 
records were correct, she would have been working an average of almost 10 hours 
a day, 365 days a year.  Ultimately, she conceded that while she worked long 
hours, she did not maintain such a schedule. 
{¶ 13} Additionally, respondent regularly submitted bills exceeding the 
fee caps for her juvenile cases.  Moreover, the former administrative judge 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
6 
 
testified that in 2006, attorneys practicing in the court were aware that he was 
“quite liberal” with approving fee requests that exceeded those caps. 
{¶ 14} As the board recognized, the facts of Holland are very similar to 
those in the case at bar.  There, the respondent overcharged a juvenile court for 
services he provided as court-appointed counsel.  Holland, 106 Ohio St.3d 372, 
2005-Ohio-5322, 835 N.E.2d 361, at ¶ 7-8.  Although he was acquitted of 
criminal charges arising from his conduct, we agreed with the board’s 
determination that the respondent’s practice of charging multiple clients for the 
same hours violated DR 1-102(A)(4).  Id. at ¶ 19. 
{¶ 15} In Holland, we observed, “Padding client bills with hours not 
worked is tantamount to misappropriation,” and disbarment is the presumptive 
sanction for misconduct involving misappropriation.  Holland, 106 Ohio St.3d 
372, 2005-Ohio-5322, 835 N.E.2d 361, ¶ 20, citing Toledo Bar Assn. v. Batt 
(1997), 78 Ohio St.3d 189, 677 N.E.2d 349, and Dayton Bar Assn. v. Gerren, 103 
Ohio St.3d 21, 2004-Ohio-4110, 812 N.E.2d 1280, ¶ 14.  We emphasized that 
“[b]y overcharging the juvenile court, respondent exploited an already 
overburdened system designed to aid the poorest members of our society and 
lessened public confidence in the legal profession and compromised its integrity.”  
Id. at ¶ 22.  Therefore, while recognizing the respondent’s reputation and lack of a 
prior disciplinary record as mitigating factors, we concluded that his practice of 
certifying inflated fee requests that could not be explained by any conceivable 
mistake warranted a harsher sanction than the recommended one-year suspension 
with six-months stayed.  Id. at ¶ 23-25.  Accordingly, we imposed a one-year 
suspension from the practice of law.  Id. at ¶ 25. 
{¶ 16} Respondent also objects to the board’s reliance upon our decision 
in Rohrer, 124 Ohio St.3d 65, 2009-Ohio-5930, 919 N.E.2d 180, claiming that 
“the issues were completely different,” because in Rohrer, the respondent 
deliberately violated a court order not to discuss a client’s case with the media and 
January Term, 2010 
7 
 
then lied about doing so.  See Rohrer at ¶ 20.  In contrast, respondent contends 
that the board found that many of her problems were due to her “sloppy record 
keeping” and, with one exception, were not intentional.  Respondent steadfastly 
maintained that she had worked every hour she billed until relator confronted her 
with the fact that she would have had to have worked an average of almost ten 
hours per day, 365 days a year to have worked all of the hours she billed – 
testimony that was patently false in light of her admission that she did not 
maintain such a schedule.  Despite respondent’s arguments, poor record keeping 
alone cannot explain overbilling of such magnitude. 
{¶ 17} Having reviewed the record, weighed the aggravating and 
mitigating factors, and considered the sanctions imposed for comparable conduct, 
we reject respondent’s objection and adopt the board’s recommended sanction of 
a two-year license suspension with one year stayed.  Accordingly, Kristin Ann 
Stahlbush is suspended from the practice of law in the state of Ohio for two years, 
with one year stayed on the conditions that she submit to a one-year term of 
monitored probation and commit no further ethical violations.  If respondent fails 
to meet these conditions, the stay of her suspension will be lifted, and respondent 
will serve the entire two-year suspension from the practice of law.  Costs are 
taxed to respondent. 
Judgment accordingly. 
 
PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’CONNOR, O’DONNELL, FARMER, and 
CUPP, JJ., concur. 
 
BROWN, C.J., not participating. 
 
SHEILA G. FARMER, J., of the Fifth Appellate District, sitting for 
LANZINGER, J. 
__________________ 
Jonathan B. Cherry, Bar Counsel, and George E. Gerken and Vincent S. 
Mezinko, for relator. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
8 
 
Lorin J. Zaner, for respondent. 
______________________