Opinion ID: 2335410
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Permissibility of 2004 Mann Disqualification

Text: We begin our analysis with a determination whether it was legally permissible in 2004 for Judge Rome to disqualify Mann as cocounsel based on the imputed disqualification of the Bretz firm. This determination matters, because both Sellers and the judge relied upon the existence of a valid 2004 disqualification of Mann to justify the decision Judge Rome made 5 years later, that is, the decision we review today. We first take up the subject of our power to examine the merits of Judge Rome's 2004 decision, insofar as it addressed Mann. Although it is true that Venters dismissed his earlier interlocutory challenge, that dismissal poses no jurisdictional or prudential bar to our consideration of Mann's 2004 disqualification today. Venters' first interlocutory appeal focused exclusively, as did the evidentiary hearing in the district court from which it flowed, on whether Rice acquired material and confidential information in the course of his earlier employment with the Gilliland firm, thus necessitating the imputed disqualification of his new employer, the Bretz firm. It had absolutely nothing to do with disqualification of Mann as the Bretz firm's referral source or cocounsel on any legal or factual basis. In contrast, in this appeal, neither side is asking us to revisit the disqualification of the Bretz firm; and we need not reach whether Venters' voluntary dismissal of his interlocutory appeal on that issue would prevent him from raising it again via this later interlocutory appeal. Compare Flores Rentals v. Flores, 283 Kan. 476, 491, 153 P.3d 523 (2007) (only remedies for party challenging order disqualifying counsel: interlocutory appeal, appeal after final decision); K.S.A. 2010 Supp. 60-2102(c) (Court of Appeals may allow interlocutory appeal if application is made to it within 14 days after the entry of the order of district court). Today we concern ourselves only with the 2009 Mann disqualification, and the correctness of any decision Judge Rome made or purported to make about Mann in 2004 is properly before us as the 2009 decision's indispensable infrastructure. In 2004, Judge Rome ruled that the Bretz law firm must be disqualified from representing Venters in this case because of Rice's employment at the Bretz firm after his move from the Gilliland firm. This disqualification of the Bretz law firm is known as imputed disqualification. See, e.g., Monroe v. City of Topeka, 267 Kan. 440, 446, 988 P.2d 228 (1999). Any knowledge of material and confidential information on the Sellers' side of this case that Rice acquired while he was employed at the Gilliland firm was imputed to his new employer, the Bretz firm. The only question before the court was whether Rice had acquired such knowledge, and Judge Rome decided that he had. Thus, Rice had to be disqualified personally and his new firm was subject to imputed disqualification. There was no dispute on whether Rice's new firm was the Bretz law firm. Mann's situation in 2004 stands in complete contrast. He was not subject to disqualification personally. Unlike Rice, Mann possessed no material and confidential information gained from the Sellers' side of the case while affiliated with the Gilliland firm. If Mann was subject to disqualification at all, it had to be imputed disqualification because Judge Rome deemed Mann a part of the Bretz law firm at which Rice was a new employee. At the time of Judge Rome's 2004 decision, KRPC 1.10 provided: (a) While lawyers are associated in a firm, none of them shall knowingly represent a client when any one of them practicing alone would be prohibited from doing so by Rules 1.7, 1.8(c), 1.9 or 2.2 (b) When a lawyer becomes associated with a firm, the firm may not knowingly represent a person in the same or a substantially related matter in which that lawyer, or a firm with which the lawyer was associated, had previously represented a client whose interests are materially adverse to that person and about whom the lawyer had acquired information protected by Rules 1.6 and 1.9(b) that is material to the matter. (c) When a lawyer has terminated an association with a firm, the firm is not prohibited from thereafter representing a person with interests materially adverse to those of a client represented by the formerly associated lawyer unless: (1) the matter is the same or substantially related to that in which the formerly associated lawyer represented the client; and (2) any lawyer remaining in the firm has information protected by Rules 1.6 and 1.9(b) that is material to the matter. (d) A disqualification prescribed by this Rule may be waived by the affected client under the conditions stated in Rule 1.7. (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 402-03.) The Comment to Rule 1.10 suggested that a functional analysis was the best approach for addressing imputed disqualification in the situation where a lawyer moves between law firms and noted that [t]wo functions are involved: [p]reserving confidentiality and avoiding positions adverse to a client. (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 405.) The Terminology section of Rule 226 (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 335), the umbrella rule for the Kansas Rules of Professional Conduct, defined a law firm in the following manner: `Firm' or `Law firm' denotes a lawyer or lawyers in a private firm, lawyers employed in the legal department of a corporation or other organization[,] and lawyers employed in a legal services organization. (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 341.) The Comment to Rule 1.10 also was helpful on the meaning of the term firm: For the purposes of the Rules of Professional Conduct, the term `firm' includes lawyers in a private firm, and lawyers employed in the legal department of a corporation or other organization, or in a legal services organization. Whether two or more lawyers constitute a firm within this definition can depend on the specific facts.  (Emphasis added.) (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 403.) This Comment also set out factors to be considered in determining whether the relationship between two practitioners meant that they constituted a firm for purposes of the rule. These factors included shared office space, representations to the public that the lawyers constitute a firm, conduct of practice as a firm, the terms of any formal agreement between the lawyers, and mutual access to confidential client information. According to the Comment, whether the lawyers represented themselves as a firm and/or conducted themselves as a firm was paramount. If it was unclear whether two attorneys formed a firm for purposes of Rule 1.10, the underlying purpose of the ruleto give effect to the principle of loyalty to the clientshould be vindicated. (2004 Kan. Ct. R. Annot. 403.) When Judge Rome was making his decision about the imputed disqualification of the Bretz law firm in 2004, there was no substantial competent evidence before him to support either factual findings or, in turn, an ultimate legal conclusion that Mann must also be subject to imputed disqualification. Sellers' motion to disqualify and its attached copy of Dillon's letter referring to Mann as co-counsel constituted mere allegations from an opposing party, which, in this context, should have been viewed with a jaundiced eye. See Associated Wholesale Grocers, Inc., 266 Kan. at 1058, 975 P.2d 231. Even assuming those allegations were accurate, they did not make Mann's imputed disqualification automatic. See ABA Annot. Model Rules Professional Conduct Rule 1. 10, p. 176 (When two lawyers from different firms serve as co-counsel in a matter, their relationship does not mean that the conflicts of each are imputed to the firm of the other.). Judge Rome failed to analyze the import of cocounsel or referring counsel status under the governing legal standard set forth in KRPC 1. 10, its Comments, and its associated definitions. He did no functional analysis of the specific facts of any association between Mann and the Bretz law firm. He conducted no examination of whether Mann was part of the firmwhether they shared office space, represented to the public that they were a firm, practiced jointly, had any formal agreement, or granted each other access to confidential client information. Without the appropriate legal analysis, Judge Rome could not extend the 2004 imputed disqualification of the Bretz law firm to Mann. See Gonzalez, 290 Kan. at 756, 234 P.3d 1 (failure to abide by legal framework constitutes abuse of discretion).