[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. Gildee, 134 Ohio St.3d 374, 2012-Ohio-5641.] 

DISCIPLINARY COUNSEL v. GILDEE. 

[Cite as Disciplinary Counsel v. Gildee, 134 Ohio St.3d 374, 2012-Ohio-5641.] 

Attorneys—Misconduct—Violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct, 

including failing to maintain client funds in a separate account and 

making false statements of material fact in connection with a disciplinary 

matter—Two-year suspension, one year stayed on conditions. 

(No. 2012-1011—Submitted August 22, 2012—Decided December 5, 2012.) 

ON CERTIFIED REPORT by the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and 

Discipline of the Supreme Court, No. 11-088. 

___________________ 

Per Curiam.

{¶ 1} Respondent, Eva Catherine Gildee of Columbus, Ohio, Attorney 

Registration No. 0072685, was admitted to the practice of law in Ohio in 2000. 

The Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline recommends that we 

suspend Gildee from the practice of law for two years with one year stayed on 

conditions. We accept the board’s findings of professional misconduct and its 

recommendation of a two-year, partially stayed, suspension. 

{¶ 2} Relator, disciplinary counsel, charged Gildee in a two-count 

complaint with multiple violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct. The 

parties stipulated to certain facts, rule violations, and aggravating and mitigating 

factors. They jointly recommended that Gildee be suspended from the practice of 

law for two years with one year stayed upon the conditions that she commit no 

further misconduct and that she not be reinstated until she pays restitution of 

$11,290.98 to the client who had submitted the grievance against her. 

{¶ 3} A panel of three board members heard the case and made findings 

of fact and conclusions of law. The panel recommended adopting the parties’ 
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stipulated sanction. The board adopted the findings, conclusions, and 

recommendation of the panel. 

{¶ 4} The parties have not objected to the board’s report and 

recommendation. 

Misconduct

Count One—Failing to Deliver Client Funds and 

Fabricating a Letter to Justify the Failure

{¶ 5} In 2007, Gildee agreed to represent a client and his company on a 

one-third contingent-fee basis in a commercial-lease dispute against a sports club 

and its owner in the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas. In 2008, the case 

settled, and the defendants agreed to pay the client a lump-sum payment of 

$32,500, followed by quarterly payments representing a percentage of the lease 

payments received from a new tenant over the next four years. In January 2008, 

Gildee gave her client a check drawn on her client trust account in the amount of 

$21,669.92, which represented two-thirds of the $32,500 settlement payment. 

{¶ 6} After the defendants obtained a new tenant, Gildee received a lease 

payment from them in an amount below what Gildee and her client had been 

expecting, given the value of the lease. In July 2008, the client agreed to retain 

Gildee to pursue a second lawsuit against the club and its owner for breach of the 

settlement agreement entered in the first lawsuit; the money that was owed to the 

client on the first lease payment was used as a retainer against which Gildee 

would charge $175 per hour. 

{¶ 7} The defendants continued to send Gildee lease payments, and the 

client ultimately decided not to pursue the claim for breach of the settlement 

agreement. Gildee did not deposit all of the payments into her client trust 

account, instead cashing some of them or depositing them into her operating 

account. The contingent-fee agreement required Gildee to disburse $8,347.60 of 
January Term, 2012 

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the lease payments made by the defendants to the client, but she misappropriated 

these funds. 

{¶ 8} In July 2011, Gildee falsely asserted to relator that she had advised 

the client that she was applying a portion of the lease payments to satisfy the 

client’s outstanding legal fees. At that time, Gildee gave relator a letter dated 

January 3, 2010, addressed to her client that stated that she was retracting her 

prior policy of overlooking fees that he owed her for the legal services rendered 

because the client had filed a complaint with relator about her actions. Gildee 

later admitted to relator that she had created the letter before her July 2011 

meeting with relator and that she had backdated it to January 3, 2010. 

{¶ 9} The board found, and we agree, that Gildee’s conduct violated 

Prof.Cond.R. 1.15(a) (requiring a lawyer to hold property of clients in an interestbearing trust account, separate from the lawyer’s own property), 1.15(d) 

(requiring a lawyer to promptly deliver funds or other property that a client or 

third party is entitled to receive), 8.1 (prohibiting a lawyer from knowingly 

making a false statement of material fact in connection with a disciplinary 

matter), 8.4(c) (prohibiting a lawyer from engaging in conduct involving 

dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation), and 8.4(h) (prohibiting a lawyer 

from engaging in conduct that adversely reflects on the lawyer’s fitness to 

practice law). 

{¶ 10} The parties stipulated to the dismissal of a charge of violating 

Prof.Cond.R. 1.16(e) (a lawyer who withdraws from employment shall promptly 

refund any fee paid in advance that has not been earned). We dismiss this charge. 

Count Two—Lying about Transmitting Payment to Client

{¶ 11} Before the settlement in the common pleas court case in 2008, the 

court found the defendants to be in contempt of court and ordered them to pay 

attorney fees in the amount of $7,500. In August 2009, the client filed a 

grievance against Gildee claiming that she had coerced him into accepting the 
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settlement agreement and had failed to remit his share of the fee award. After 

relator investigated the complaint and determined that there was insufficient 

evidence to establish that Gildee had pressured her client into agreeing to the 

settlement, Gildee agreed to pay the client half of the fee award—$3,750—by 

April 17, 2010. 

{¶ 12} When Gildee failed to make the payment as promised, her client 

contacted relator. On September 28, 2010, Gildee paid the client $1,000, leaving 

a balance due of $2,750. After relator contacted Gildee about the status of the 

payments, Gildee sent relator a facsimile in December 2010 of a letter she had 

purportedly sent to her client on the same day, along with a copy of a check for 

$1,000 drawn on her personal account and payable to the client. Gildee never 

sent the letter or check to the client. After the client again complained to relator 

that he had not received any further payment, relator contacted Gildee. 

{¶ 13} On May 3, 2011, Gildee sent a facsimile to relator of a letter that 

she had purportedly sent to her client on May 2, 2011, along with a copy of a 

check for $1,500 drawn on her personal account and payable to the client. Gildee 

never sent the letter or check to the client. Gildee did not have sufficient funds in 

her account to cover the check, and she failed to inform relator that she never 

mailed the letter and check to her client. 

{¶ 14} The board found, and we agree, that Gildee’s conduct violated 

Prof.Cond.R. 8.1, 8.4(c), and 8.4(h). 

Sanction

{¶ 15} “When imposing sanctions for attorney misconduct, we consider 

relevant factors, including the duties the lawyer violated and sanctions imposed in 

similar cases.” Toledo Bar Assn. v. Weisberg, 124 Ohio St.3d 274, 2010-Ohio142, 921 N.E.2d 641, ¶ 15. “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 
January Term, 2012 

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the Board of Commissioners on Grievances and Discipline (‘BCGD Proc.Reg.’).” 

Cleveland Metro. Bar Assn. v. Mishler, 127 Ohio St.3d 336, 2010-Ohio-5987, 939 

N.E.2d 852, ¶ 45. 

{¶ 16} The board found the following aggravating factors: (1) a dishonest 

and selfish motive, (2) multiple offenses, (3) resulting harm to the victim, and (4) 

failure to make restitution. See BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(1)(b), (d), (h), and (i). In 

mitigation, the board found the following factors: (1) absence of a prior 

disciplinary record, (2) full and free disclosure to the board during the disciplinary 

process, and (3) positive character evidence. See BCGD Proc.Reg. 10(B)(2)(a), 

(d), and (e). The board was particularly impressed by the genuine remorse that 

Gildee expressed during the hearing, the fact that her legal career has been 

otherwise exemplary, and the fact that her lack of restitution to the client was a 

consequence of her dire financial condition. 

{¶ 17} “The presumptive sanction for misappropriation of client funds is 

disbarment.” Disciplinary Counsel v. Burchinal, 133 Ohio St.3d 38, 2012-Ohio3882, 975 N.E.2d 960, ¶ 17. But we have tempered this sanction when the 

misconduct constitutes a solitary event in an otherwise untarnished legal career. 

Disciplinary Counsel v. Claflin, 107 Ohio St.3d 31, 2005-Ohio-5827, 836 N.E.2d 

564, ¶ 15. This is the case here. And similar to the circumstances in Burchinal, 

Gildee’s multiple acts of dishonesty require an actual suspension from the 

practice of law, but the mitigating evidence—including the absence of a 

disciplinary record, full and free disclosure to the board, positive character 

evidence, and genuine remorse—warrant a lesser sanction than disbarment. 

Burchinal at ¶ 19. 

{¶ 18} Upon our independent review of the pertinent factors, we agree 

that the sanction recommended by the board is appropriate. We therefore suspend 

Gildee from the practice of law in Ohio for two years, with one year of the 

suspension stayed on the conditions that Gildee commit no further violation of the 
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disciplinary rules and that Gildee not be reinstated to the practice of law until she 

has made full restitution to the client in the amount of $11,290.98. Costs are 

taxed to respondent. 

Judgment accordingly. 

O’CONNOR, C.J., and PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’DONNELL,

LANZINGER, CUPP, and MCGEE BROWN, JJ., concur. 

_____________________ 

 Jonathan E. Coughlan, Disciplinary Counsel, and Joseph M. Caligiuri, 

Senior Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, for relator. 

 Eva C. Gildee, pro se. 

_____________________