Title: Disciplinary Counsel v. McCully

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. McCully, 97 Ohio St.3d 486, 2002-Ohio-6724.] 
 
 
OFFICE OF DISCIPLINARY COUNSEL v. MCCULLY. 
[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. McCully, 97 Ohio St.3d 486, 2002-Ohio-6724.] 
Attorneys at law — Misconduct — Two-year suspension with one year of 
sanction stayed — Commingling clients’ funds with own funds while 
serving as guardian, attorney for the guardianship, and, ultimately, 
attorney for the deceased ward’s estate — Failing to account for 
approximately $12,000 of client’s money — Failing to cooperate in 
investigation of misconduct. 
(No. 2002-1138 — Submitted August 27, 2002 — Decided December 18, 2002.) 
ON CERTIFIED REPORT by the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 
Discipline of the Supreme Court, No. 01-56. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam. 
{¶1} 
This case requires us to decide the sanction for an attorney who (1) 
commingled her clients’ funds with her own while serving as guardian, attorney 
for the guardianship, and, ultimately, attorney for her deceased ward’s estate, (2) 
failed to appropriately account for approximately $12,000 of her client’s money, 
and (3) did not cooperate in the investigation of this misconduct.  The Board of 
Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline found that respondent Joanne 
McCully (n.k.a. Brown) of Cleveland, Ohio, Attorney Registration No. 0050039, 
committed these acts in violation of DR 1-102(A)(4) (conduct involving fraud, 
deceit, dishonesty, or misrepresentation), 1-102(A)(6) (conduct that adversely 
reflects on an attorney’s fitness to practice law), 9-102(B)(3) (failure to maintain 
complete records of and appropriately account for client’s funds in attorney’s 
possession), and 9-102(B)(4) (failure to promptly deliver funds to which client is 
entitled), and Gov.Bar R. V(4)(G) (failure to cooperate in an investigation of 
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misconduct).  The board recommended that respondent be suspended from the 
practice of law in Ohio for two years, with one year stayed.  We agree that this 
sanction is appropriate. 
{¶2} 
In the summer of 1993, one of two grandsons of a very elderly 
woman asked respondent to look after their grandmother’s care and affairs.  
Respondent agreed and arranged for the grandmother to enter a senior health care 
facility where she resided until her death on February 7, 1994.  The grandsons 
also wanted to sell their grandmother’s residence in which they held remainder 
interests subject to her life estate. 
{¶3} 
Respondent was appointed the grandmother’s guardian in August 
1993 and thereafter also served as attorney for the guardianship.  In November 
1993, respondent received a $22,200 check, payable to her as guardian, for 
proceeds from the sale of the residence, although the sale itself was not finalized 
until after her ward’s death.  Respondent deposited the check into a bank account 
that had not been set up to hold client assets in trust.  She later wrote checks to 
herself and for cash from this account.  Respondent did not have probate court 
approval for the sale of the residential property,1 and in July 1993, she filed an 
inventory of the guardianship assets that valued the residential property at 
$27,000 but did not mention the $22,200 payment. 
{¶4} 
In August 1994, after apparently agreeing to be the attorney for her 
deceased ward’s estate, respondent completed the application to probate the 
ward’s will as well as the final guardianship report.  The $22,200 payment was 
not identified in the guardianship report.  Respondent later prepared and filed 
various other documents in the estate that should have, but did not, account for the 
receipt of the $22,200 payment or any distribution of these funds. 
                                                 
1. 
Respondent did file a complaint on February 4, 1994, seeking authority to sell the 
residential property; however, when respondent’s ward died several days later, the complaint was 
dismissed sua sponte more than two years later.   
January Term, 2002 
3 
{¶5} 
Another attorney hired by a grandson eventually brought the 
irregularities in respondent’s guardianship and estate filings to the attention of 
relator, Disciplinary Counsel, who sent a letter of inquiry to respondent.  In reply, 
respondent represented that one of the grandsons authorized her to pay for funeral 
expenses and a portion of the decedent’s debts and that she had done so from the 
account in which she deposited the $22,200 check.  She stated that the grandson 
also authorized respondent to pay herself attorney fees for her services from the 
account in which she deposited the sale proceeds.  She did so without the requisite 
probate court approval for such attorney fee payments. 
{¶6} 
In June 2000, relator requested that respondent provide a complete 
accounting for the $22,200 and its distribution.  During its investigation, relator 
learned that respondent had written a $3,000 check for funeral expenses and that 
she had written a $7,000 check back to the purchaser of residential property to 
pay for repairs, allegedly also at a grandson’s direction.  Respondent had also 
written a third check, for $200, to the buyer.  All three checks were drawn from 
the account in which respondent had deposited the $22,200, and none of the 
payments was approved by the probate court.  Beyond this, respondent could not 
specifically account for the remaining $12,000 that she had accepted in trust for 
her clients. 
{¶7} 
On June 11, 2002, relator filed a complaint charging respondent 
with professional misconduct.  A panel of the board heard the matter, found the 
facts as stated, albeit with two inconsequential exceptions,2 and concluded that 
respondent had violated DR 1-102(A)(4) and (6) and 9-102(B)(3) and (4).  The 
panel also found, apparently because respondent’s responses to investigatory 
efforts were so vague and inconsistent, that respondent had failed to cooperate.  
                                                 
2. 
The panel mistakenly reported that the check respondent received from the sale of her 
ward’s residence was for $22,000 instead of $22,200, and the panel did not mention the $200 that 
respondent repaid to the purchaser by check. 
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The panel recommended that respondent be suspended from the practice of law 
for two years, with one year of this period stayed.  The board adopted the panel’s 
findings of misconduct and recommendation. 
{¶8} 
We agree with the board’s decision.  In attempting to explain why 
she deposited a check made out to the guardianship of her ward in an account for 
her own use and did not reveal this to the probate court, respondent testified that 
she thought the $22,200 check represented the proceeds from the sale of the 
grandsons’ remainder interest in their grandmother’s residence and, thus, was not 
an asset of the guardianship.  She also thought that the grandsons had agreed to 
pay for her services out of the sale proceeds. 
{¶9} 
There appears to have been some understanding between 
respondent and at least one of the grandsons that the grandsons would have to rely 
on proceeds from the sale of their grandmother’s house to pay creditors and 
respondent’s fees.  Regardless, respondent had no authority to commingle those 
funds with her own. 
{¶10} The board found no clear and convincing evidence of theft in this 
case, largely because respondent did supply proof of her considerable work and 
expenses.  Nevertheless, without any accounting or probate court oversight, the 
record does not reliably explain why it is that the grandsons, who apparently were 
their grandmother’s only heirs, received nothing from her estate.  Nor does the 
record explain why respondent received $22,200 in payment for a residential 
property that one of the grandsons recalls having had a sale price of just $16,000.  
Furthermore, respondent’s assurances that she made substantial payments to the 
providers of her ward’s housing and medical care cannot be reconciled with the 
fact that these creditors have no record of her remittances. 
{¶11} Accordingly, we find that respondent committed the cited 
misconduct and we concur in the recommended sanction.  Respondent is therefore 
January Term, 2002 
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suspended from the practice of law for two years, with one year stayed.  Costs are 
taxed to respondent. 
Judgment accordingly. 
 
MOYER, C.J., DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
 
Jonathan E. Coughlan, Disciplinary Counsel, and Stacy Solochek 
Beckman, Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, for relator. 
 
C. Randolph Keller and William T. Doyle, for respondent. 
__________________