Opinion ID: 1454365
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: other matters raised by griffith

Text: Griffith's brief in this court claimed under the heading of OTHER ERRORS that he was prejudiced by the following: 1. The denial of his motion to vacate the order consolidating his case with the case against Wolf. 2. The denial of his motion for a separate hearing on sanctions pursuant to BR 5.7. 3. The denial of his counsel's motion during the hearing to continue the hearing until Griffith could read the testimony of crucial witnesses and determine if further cross-examination or other additional evidence was necessary, and if so, for leave to present such additional evidence. (Footnotes omitted.) The hearing before the Trial Panel commenced on Monday, February 10th, on the complaints against both Griffith and Wolf who were represented by different counsel. On Thursday, February 13th, the counsel for Wolf announced at the commencement of the proceedings for that day that his client was going to resign from the Oregon State Bar. This court on February 14th, entered an order accepting Wolf's resignation. The proceeding continued against Griffith. Griffith's contention is that he was prejudiced before the Trial Panel from guilt by association with Wolf. Because this is an obvious problem when two or more lawyers are charged with the same conduct we have carefully reviewed the record to determine if Griffith was prejudiced. We find that the Trial Panel was very careful not to find Griffith at fault merely because he was involved in the same business and law firm with Wolf. BR 5.7 provides: Trial panels shall not consider evidence relating to the imposition of sanctions until after all evidence regarding the merits of the Bar's charges have been heard and a finding of misconduct has been made, except as stipulated by Bar Counsel and the accused. The issue of sanction shall, however, be considered at the same hearing, subject to the discretion of the trial panel chairperson to reconvene the panel to consider evidence in aggravation or mitigation of the misconduct found to have occurred in cases of such complexity or seriousness as to so warrant. BR 5.7 answers Griffith's second contention. A separate hearing on the question of sanctions was within the discretion of the Trial Panel chairman. Griffith's third contention that he should have been allowed a postponement to read the testimony of the crucial witnesses is answered by our previous discussion on the motion to continue the entire hearing. Griffith by his election to attend and participate in the medical malpractice case in Deschutes County in effect waived his right to appear in this matter. All three of these contentions by Griffith come under the heading of discretion by the Trial Panel. We find that there was no abuse of discretion.