Opinion ID: 1201708
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: we have jurisdiction to discipline respondent

Text: Respondent initially argues we do not have jurisdiction to discipline him because all the acts occurred prior to his licensure as an attorney. Both parties treat the question of our jurisdiction as if it is a question of first impression. We believe it is not. In State ex rel. Oklahoma Bar Association v. Brandon, 450 P.2d 824 (Okla. 1969), a similar argument was made where an attorney was disciplined for misconduct, the majority of the conduct occurring before he was licensed as an attorney. Brandon involved a situation where the respondent lawyer had made long distance telephone calls without paying for them. Most of the acts occurred while he was a law student, but at least one occurred after he was licensed. He was also convicted of certain crimes in federal court associated with the telephone calls after he was licensed. Although not all of the alleged acts of misconduct occurred prior to licensure in Brandon, we made it quite clear our then current rules on discipline gave us jurisdiction to discipline an attorney for acts committed prior to his admittance to the Bar. Id. at 827-828. The respondent in Brandon argued that language in our Bar rules concerning what acts would subject a lawyer to discipline could never have been intended to reach back into the days when he was a law student. The language from Article 9, Section 4, Bar Rules adopted September 14, 1966, was as follows, any act contrary to honesty, justice or good morals, whether in the course of his professional capacity, or otherwise. (emphasis added) Brandon at 827. We held some slight change in the language from a prior rule created no substantive change in the rule and we implicitly held both the prior and former rules gave us jurisdiction to discipline an attorney for conduct occurring prior to his admittance if it showed his present unfitness to practice law. Id. at 827-828. The present Rule corresponding to Article 9, Section 4 is Rule 1.3 of the Rules Governing Disciplinary Proceedings, 5 O.S. 1991, Ch. 1, App. 1-A, which provides: The commission by any lawyer of any act contrary to prescribed standards of conduct, whether in the course of his professional capacity, or otherwise, which act would reasonably be found to bring discredit upon the legal profession, shall be grounds for disciplinary action, whether or not the act is a felony or misdemeanor, or a crime at all. Conviction in a criminal proceeding is not a condition precedent to the imposition of discipline. (emphasis added) We believe current Rule 1.3, just as the prior rules involved in Brandon, is sufficiently broad to give us jurisdiction to discipline this respondent for conduct occurring prior to his licensure as an attorney. We also note had respondent been criminally convicted of these embezzlements our rules would surely have allowed for discipline. See 5 O.S. 1991, Ch. 1, App. 1-A, Rules 7.17.7, as amended (summary disciplinary proceedings for criminal conviction of a lawyer). We believe it would be absurd to rule we have jurisdiction if a lawyer is convicted after licensure for a crime committed before licensure which shows unfitness, but we have no jurisdiction for admitted embezzlement occurring up until a month or two before licensure where for some reason no prosecution is ever instituted.