Court Opinion

ID: 9701903
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 22:42:42.479398+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:30.610697
License: Public Domain

Murphy, C. J.,

dissenting'.

I agree with the majority that the crime. of which respondent Brewster stands convicted does not involve moral turpitude and does not warrant disbarment. I cannot agree with the majority, however, that since the crime does *481not involve moral turpitude, the disciplinary petition must be dismissed.
Brewster was convicted of violating 18 U.S.C. § 201 (g) and sentenced to pay a fine of $10,000. In view of the conviction, the disciplinary petition filed by Bar Counsel specifically charged Brewster with violating Disciplinary Rules 1-102, 8-101, and 9-101 (C), which read:
“DR 1-102 Misconduct.
“(A) A lawyer shall not:
(1) Violate a Disciplinary Rule.
(2) Circumvent a Disciplinary Rule through actions of another.
(3) Engage in illegal conduct involving moral turpitude.
(4) Engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation.
(5) Engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice.
(6) Engage in any other conduct that adversely reflects on his fitness to practice law.”
“DR 8-101 Action as a Public Official.
“(A) A lawyer who holds public office shall not:
(1) Use his public position to obtain, or attempt to obtain, a special advantage in legislative matters for himself or for a client under circumstances where he knows or it is obvious that such action is not in the public interest.
(2) Use his public position to influence, or attempt to influence, a tribunal to act in favor of himself or of a client.
(3) Accept any thing of value from any person when the lawyer knows or it is obvious that the offer is for the purpose of influencing his action as a public official.”
*482“DR 9-101 Avoiding Even thé Appearance of Impropriety.
“(C) A lawyer shall not state or imply that he is able to influence improperly or upon irrelevant. grounds any tribunal, legislative body, or. public official.”
Having charged a violation of these Disciplinary Rules, the petition characterized the crime of which Brewster was convicted as one “involving moral turpitude.”
The majority erroneously holds that “the petition for disciplinary action filed under Maryland Rule BV9 charged ... [Brewster] only with conviction of a crime involving moral turpitude ....” It says that the charging document “referred solely to illegal conduct involving moral turpitude,” and as a consequence Brewster was required to defend only with respect to an alleged violation of DR 1-102 (A) (3) (“A lawyer shall not engage in illegal conduct involving moral turpitude.”). The majority holds that Brewster was given no notice of charges with respect to any of the other Disciplinary Rules and that Bar Counsel failed to inform him “as to what conduct of . .. [his] amounts to a violation of these rules.”
The majority has in effect held that, notwithstanding the recitals in the petition that Brewster’s conviction constituted a violation of DR 1-102, 8-101, and 9-101 (C), these charges were wiped out, subsumed by, or merged into the sole specification of DR 1-102 (A) (3) — that a lawyer shall not “[e]ngage in illegal conduct involving moral turpitude.” In so concluding, I think the Court has too narrowly read the allegations of the disciplinary petition and placed a hyper-technical construction on its content. As a consequence, it has gutted the disciplinary petition of its central allegations without any valid reason.
This indeed was a simple disciplinary proceeding. A lawyer had been convicted of a crime and his guilt of the offense was beyond challenge at the disciplinary hearing. See Maryland Rule BV10 e 1. The disciplinary petition filed *483by Bar Counsel was required by Rule BV9 c to be “sufficiently clear and specific reasonably to inform the attorney proceeded against of any misconduct charged .. ..” As heretofore indicated, in view of Brewster’s conviction, the disciplinary petition charged him with specified violations of the Disciplinary Rules and averred that the crime was one which involved moral turpitude. Whether the crime actually involved moral turpitude or not was not the full measure of the charges specified in the petition, and neither Brewster, nor the three-judge panel which heard the charges, thought that it was. No evidence was adduced other than the fact of the conviction and the panel below therefore found no violation of DR 8-101 or 9-101 (C). It did conclude, however, that the crime of which Brewster was convicted did constitute misconduct, as charged, but did not involve moral turpitude — a conclusion with which Brewster even now does not disagree. At no time in the proceedings below, or before us, has Brewster ever suggested that he had no knowledge of, or was not charged with, the full range of disciplinary violations specified in the petition.
The conclusion reached by the majority in this case is plainly at odds with the result reached in Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Walman, 280 Md. 453, 374 A. 2d 354 (1977). In that case, an attorney had been convicted of wilful failure to file his federal income tax return in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7203. The disciplinary petition against him charged:
“That the Respondent, in violation of DR 1-102 (A) (3), (4), (5) and (6), did unethically and unprofessionally engage in illegal conduct involving moral turpitude, did engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation, did engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice, did engage in conduct that adversely reflects upon his fitness to practice law, in that Respondent willfully failed to file a federal income tax return for the calendar year 1968, and as a result thereof was indicted by the United States Grand Jury for the District of *484Maryland, to which he pled ‘guilty’ and was sentenced, by the United States District Court for the District of Maryland ... .”
A divided Court there held that the crime of which the attorney was convicted did not involve moral turpitude. It did not, however, dismiss the petition; rather it suspended the attorney on the ground that his conviction constituted misconduct under DR 1-102 (A) (5) and (6) “prejudicial to the administration of justice” and which “adversely reflected] on ... [the attorney’s] fitness to practice law.”
The only real difference between this case and Walman is that, in the latter, the disciplinary petition quoted verbatim the subsections of DR 1-102 alleged to have been violated, whereas here, the petition charged a violation of these same subsections but did not quote their content. To conclude, as the majority apparently does, that this is a distinction of substance is to exalt form over substance to a degree certain to cause grief to the legal profession and to the public interest.
I think a finding of misconduct violative of DR 1-102 (A) (5) and (6) is plainly indicated in this case. An appropriate sanction, in my view, would be suspension from the practice of law for a six-month period.