Title: Columbus Bar Assn. v. Mangan

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as 
Columbus Bar Assn. v. Mangan, Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-5287.] 
 
 
 
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. 2009-OHIO-5287 
COLUMBUS BAR ASSOCIATION v. MANGAN. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as Columbus Bar Assn. v. Mangan,  
Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-5287.] 
Attorneys — Misconduct — Handling a legal matter without adequate 
preparation — Representing multiple clients without obtaining consent 
from each client after full disclosure — Public reprimand. 
(No. 2009-1127 — Submitted August 11, 2009 — Decided October 13, 2009.) 
ON CERTIFIED REPORT by the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 
Discipline of the Supreme Court, No.  08-051. 
__________________ 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} Respondent, Patrick F. Mangan of Columbus, Ohio, Attorney 
Registration No. 0016104, was admitted to the practice of law in Ohio in 1979.  
The Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline recommends that we 
publicly reprimand respondent, based mainly on findings that he undertook the 
representation of a father, son, and daughter-in-law without first advising them of 
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the risks presented by their potentially conflicting interests and obtaining each 
person’s consent to having a single advocate.  We accept the board’s finding that 
respondent’s conduct violated ethical standards incumbent on Ohio lawyers and 
the recommendation for a public reprimand. 
{¶ 2} Relator, Columbus Bar Association, charged respondent with 
violations of the Disciplinary Rules of the Code of Professional Responsibility, 
including DR 5-105(C) (prohibiting a lawyer from representing multiple clients 
with conflicting interests unless “it is obvious that [the lawyer] can adequately 
represent the interest of each and if each consents to the representation after full 
disclosure of the possible effect of such representation on the exercise of [the 
lawyer’s] professional judgment on behalf of each”) and 6-101(A)(2) (prohibiting 
a lawyer from undertaking a legal matter without adequate preparation under the 
circumstances).  A three-member panel of the board heard the case, including the 
parties’ stipulations to the cited misconduct, made findings of fact and 
conclusions of law, and recommended a public reprimand.  The board adopted the 
panel’s findings of misconduct and recommendation. 
{¶ 3} The parties have not objected to the board report. 
Misconduct 
{¶ 4} Respondent has practiced for 30 years in probate and real estate 
law, working for various employers, including the Legal Aid Society of 
Columbus, UAW Legal Services, and Hyatt Legal Services.  He practiced in 
association with several attorneys from 1995 until 2005, when he opened his own 
practice in Columbus. 
{¶ 5} A father belonging to a prepaid legal services plan consulted 
respondent in January 2005 about a pending foreclosure action.  CIT 
Group/Consumer Finance, Inc. (“CIT”), had filed the action in early December 
2004, seeking to foreclose on a single-family dwelling that the father and his son 
January Term, 2009 
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had inherited in June 2002.  Respondent agreed to represent all defendants in the 
foreclosure action ⎯ the father, his son, and the son’s wife. 
{¶ 6} Despite this agreement, respondent never communicated with 
either the son or the daughter-in-law, relying instead on the father’s assurances 
that the father was acting on behalf of his son and daughter-in-law.  But in fact, 
the couple did not know of the foreclosure proceedings.  And even before the 
foreclosure proceedings began, the couple had been dissatisfied with the father’s 
decisions about the property. 
{¶ 7} In 2002, the father had borrowed $37,194 (approximately one-half 
of the equity in the appraised value of the house) to upgrade the house so he could 
move into it or they could sell it.  The father and son signed a mortgage against 
the house.  In the years that followed, the father made some improvements but 
ultimately gutted the kitchen.  The son realized the extent of disrepair and, in 
2005, he and his wife refused to allow the father to borrow more money by using 
the home as collateral. 
{¶ 8} But by then, the home was already in foreclosure because, 
unknown to his son and daughter-in-law, the father had stopped making mortgage 
payments sometime in 2004.  And by the time the father consulted respondent in 
early 2005, the balance owed on the mortgage had grown to $47,700, the cost to 
reinstate the loan was $10,000, and the homeowners needed another $20,000 loan 
to complete the kitchen, roof, and HVAC renovations.  Thus, after reinstating the 
loan, completing the necessary renovations, and selling the property for the new 
estimated fair market value of $75,000, including paying a 6 percent realtor 
commission ($4,500) and closing costs ($2,000), the homeowners would have 
realized only about $790 in profit. 
{¶ 9} Respondent discussed at length with the father the possibility of 
reinstating the loan, but the father did not have the financial resources.  
Respondent consequently filed an answer to the complaint, but without any input 
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from the son and daughter-in-law.  The court thereafter granted summary 
judgment in favor of CIT, and the house sold at a sheriff’s sale for $53,000, 
$22,000 under the appraised value. 
{¶ 10} The son and daughter-in-law did not learn of the foreclosure until 
Christmas 2005, when a neighbor advised that the property had been sold.  The 
daughter-in-law soon contacted respondent, who only then realized his mistake.  
The couple filed a grievance with relator, hired another attorney, and ultimately 
recovered $3,700 in proceeds from the foreclosure that had been held in escrow. 
{¶ 11} Respondent, who was not compensated for his representation, 
candidly admitted that he had “dropped the ball” by failing to contact the son and 
daughter-in-law and by focusing only on the filing of a timely answer.  He 
acknowledged that he should have sent the couple a copy of the answer and 
expressed his sincere regret for the oversight.  To ensure that he does not repeat 
the mistake, respondent has redoubled his efforts to keep each client adequately 
informed of developments in his or her case. 
{¶ 12} The parties stipulated and the board found that respondent’s acts 
and omissions in relation to this family’s property foreclosure violated DR 5-
105(C) and 6-101(A)(2).  Because respondent failed to gain all the parties’ 
consent to the multiple representation and did not communicate at all with two of 
them, we accept that respondent committed this misconduct. 
Sanction 
{¶ 13} In recommending a sanction for this misconduct, the panel and 
board weighed the aggravating and mitigating factors to which the parties also 
stipulated and considered their joint proposal for a public reprimand.  Adopting 
the panel’s report, the board observed: 
{¶ 14} “Mitigating factors include that Respondent has no prior 
disciplinary record, lacked a dishonest or selfish motive, cooperated in the 
disciplinary proceedings, and presented evidence of good character and 
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reputation.  Respondent submitted twelve letters from fellow lawyers, a judge and 
clients attesting to Respondent’s honesty, integrity, and competence in the 
practice of law.  These witnesses all have had extensive contact with Respondent 
both before and after he began practicing law thirty years ago in 1979.  [See 
BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(2(a), (b), (d), and (e)]. 
{¶ 15} “The sole aggravating factor may be vulnerability and resulting 
harm to the victims of the misconduct.  [See BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(1)(h)].  
However, after considering all the evidence submitted, the panel finds that any 
financial harm to the grievants had occurred prior to any involvement of 
Respondent.  [The father]  borrowed the funds on the mortgage, defaulted on the 
loan, used the proceeds for other personal items, and rendered the home 
uninhabitable and in need of further mortgage and work before he consulted 
Respondent.  The damage to [the son and daughter-in-law’s] equity was the result 
of [the father’s] actions, not Respondent’s error.  Respondent further maintained 
malpractice insurance with limits of one million dollars and no claim was made 
against him by [the son and daughter-in-law] relating to this incident.” 
{¶ 16} In Disciplinary Counsel v. Ita, 117 Ohio St.3d 477, 2008-Ohio-
1508, 884 N.E.2d 1073, we publicly reprimanded a lawyer who filed a pleading 
without knowing the identity of his clients.  That lawyer, in pursuing a client’s 
personal-injury claim, mistakenly sued for loss of consortium on behalf of the 
client’s wife.  The lawyer never communicated with the wife nor inquired about 
her status from his client and, actually, the wife and client were separated.  The 
couple later divorced, and the client ultimately agreed to indemnify his former 
wife for losses she may have sustained because he settled his personal-injury 
claim and dismissed the loss-of-consortium claim with prejudice. 
{¶ 17} Respondent in this case similarly failed to communicate with 
clients in a family setting, failed to ascertain their interests, and failed to obtain 
their informed consent to the multiple representation.  But no one has suggested 
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that respondent’s “ill-advised actions resulted from anything other than 
carelessness.”  Id. at ¶ 10.  Moreover, as in Ita, “[r]espondent's lack of any 
enmity, his heretofore unblemished professional record, his established good 
character and reputation, and his cooperation in these proceedings persuade us 
that a warning will suffice in this case.”  Id. 
{¶ 18} Respondent is therefore publicly reprimanded for his violations of 
DR 5-105(C) and 6-101(A)(2).  Costs are taxed to respondent. 
Judgment accordingly. 
 
MOYER, 
C.J., 
and 
PFEIFER, 
LUNDBERG 
STRATTON, 
O’CONNOR, 
O’DONNELL, LANZINGER, and CUPP, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
Terrence A. Grady & Associates Co., L.P.A., and Terrence A. Grady; and 
Bruce A. Campbell, Bar Counsel, and A. Alysha Clous, Assistant Bar Counsel, 
for relator. 
Mitchell, Catalano & Boda Co., L.P.A., and William Mann, for 
respondent. 
______________________