Free of Charge
By: Stephanie Volin
Tags: Misconduct, Criminal Justice, Lawyers, Pro Bono, Oregon

Oregon State Bar Bylaws assert that only lawyers in “good standing” may switch to pro bono status. However, the term “good standing” is not defined anywhere and only appears that one time in the entire 80 pages of Bylaws. In other words, “good standing” means whatever the OSB wants it to mean when push comes to shove.

In the case of Deanna Wray, “good standing” was apparently unaffected by the criminal and disciplinary investigations of her for allegedly secreting a child victim of sex abuse. In the case of Mark Johnson-Roberts, “good standing” overcame the punitive job action he suffered for helping two unethical attorneys avoid accountability.

How on earth could these two be considered lawyers of “good standing?”

The answer appears to be hiding in plain sight in OSB Bylaw 6.101 (b), which states that attorneys who elect pro bono status may provide free legal services to indigent clients under OSB certified programs or may volunteer their service to the OSB itself, as “bar counsel.”

In the latter circumstance, the client is therefore the Oregon State Bar.¹ For those unfamiliar with the legal profession and its rules of professional conduct, there is nothing more sacrosanct than a lawyer’s duty of confidentiality to their client. Under that inviolable duty, a lawyer cannot be compelled to disclose anything short of information necessary to prevent a crime or substantial bodily harm/certain death — and then, only if they are actually ethical enough to disclose it.

Deanna Wray (Left) and Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum. Photo: Oregon Women Lawyers Foundation

Wray and Johnson-Roberts could have chosen inactive status for the same cost (in bar dues) as going pro bono. Johnson-Roberts could have chosen retired status to align with the myth that his farewell notice was trying to perpetuate. Both could have even resigned their bar licenses.

But instead Deanna Wray and Mark Johnson-Roberts went pro bono. And, gasp!, neither has faced any criminal charges.

It is entirely plausible (if not probable) that the two went pro bono, at the Oregon State Bar’s urging, in order for them all to enjoy the shield of confidentiality that the attorney-client relationship provided.

Importantly, that confidentiality would extend over any work that the two performed in the OSB’s custodianship over their friend Lori Deveny’s law practice — an ongoing five-alarm shitshow that has been so badly mishandled as to appear very much deliberate.

Mark Johnson-Roberts (Left) and Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum (Right). Photo: Oregon Women Lawyers

The custodianship was apparently Johnson-Roberts’s terrible idea to begin with — and it ended up protecting Deveny more than her former clients or the public. He certainly had motivation to continue working on the matter to ensure that the OSB crossed the finish line intact. Likewise, Wray and the OSB would want a buffer zone between her and law enforcement in regard to Deveny. After all, it was the discovery of their scheme to hide a witness which has caused the slow trickle of Deveny’s bank statements and other information into the public record-sphere. These statements happen to discredit the OSB’s claims in their custodianship against Deveny.²

Johnson-Roberts also appears to have continued his stellar “work” on Megan Moeller’s cases, by using his position to continue to interfere in civil cases that arose from her brief but damaging campaign of fraud. That interference threatens the very existence of the OSB and their mandatory insurer, the Professional Liability Fund, due to their already precarious standing under federal antitrust law.³

The public continues to be harmed by the OSB’s politically-motivated failure to regulate the legal profession and their deteriorating regard for transparency. If only someone would rein them in.