Opinion ID: 2587347
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Duty Violated and the Potential Injury

Text: ¶ 11 Scholl's convictions demonstrate unquestionably a violation of Ethical Rule 8.4(b) of the Rules of Professional Conduct, which provides: It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to commit a criminal act that reflects adversely on the lawyer's honesty, trustworthiness or fitness as a lawyer in other respects. Here, Judge Scholl's actions reflected on vital aspects of honesty, trustworthiness, and fitness. ¶ 12 Despite the duty violated, no evidence was offered to suggest that Scholl's activities resulted in harm, either to clients, other lawyers, or other judges. Moreover, although Scholl faced criminal sanctions for filing false tax returns and structuring currency transactions, the Internal Revenue Service was not harmed because no taxes were evaded, no back taxes were found due, and no tax penalties were imposed. ¶ 13 The Commission cited In re Wines, 135 Ariz. 203, 660 P.2d 454 (1983), which discusses the appropriate disciplinary weight due in a case in which the lawyer's client is not harmed. There, a lawyer pled guilty to tax evasion and was given a five-year suspension. There was no harm to Wines' client. However, the court stated, [w]e cannot accept the contention that since [the lawyer's] acts did not damage his clients the public therefore needs no protection and only minimal discipline is appropriate. Id. at 208, 660 P.2d at 459. The Wines court saw no distinction, for purposes of imposing discipline, between dishonesty toward a client and dishonesty toward the government. Cheating one's client and defrauding the government are reprehensible in equal degrees. Id.; see also In re Spear, 160 Ariz. at 555, 774 P.2d at 1345 (the ABA Standards demand neither injury nor potential injury to a specific client). ¶ 14 The Commission acknowledged the absence of harm to any of Scholl's clients but concluded that his convictions caused harm to the public, the justice system, and the legal profession. The Commission maintains that harm resulted from the public resources and time expended in prosecuting Scholl. It further contends that Scholl's convictions compromised the integrity of the legal profession and harmed the community and state by engendering a loss of public confidence in the profession responsible to uphold the law. See In re Horwitz, 180 Ariz. 20, 24, 881 P.2d 352, 356 (1994) ([T]he public has a right to expect that lawyers will, in general, live as law-abiding citizens.). ¶ 15 We may never know the precise impact of Scholl's convictions on public confidence in the Bar as a whole. We do know that his transgressions were widely publicized and that the public does not look favorably upon lawyers or judges convicted of federal income tax offenses. We acknowledge, however, that Scholl has practiced law without incident since his resignation from the bench and that there is no indication that a client or anyone else has been or will be harmed by him. ¶ 16 Yet, to protect the integrity of the legal profession and foster public confidence, lawyers must not show any form of habitual disrespect for the law. See ER 8.4 cmt. (A pattern of repeated offenses ... can indicate indifference to legal obligation.).