Court Opinion

ID: 9847838
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:08:32.66921+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:38.319580
License: Public Domain

NEWMAN, J.
I dissent. In the majority opinion the paragraph that has most influenced me reads, in part: “Petitioner asserts that he has met this burden [to present stronger proof of his present honesty and integrity than one seeking admission for the first time] and urges us to consider the fact that the disbarment proceeding is the only disciplinary action ever taken against him, that all his victims have been repaid, and that there has been no hint of a problem, personal or business, involving him from 1974 to the present. Petitioner acknowledges the misconduct he committed before then and does not attempt to excuse it. He reminds us, however, that since 1974, he has worked, paid his bills and attempted to put his life in order.”
The State Bar does not deny that, since 1974, “there has been no hint of a problem, personal or business. . . . ” And my colleagues in their penultimate paragraph correctly assess basic weaknesses of the State Bar’s contentions {ante, p. 404). Then, surprisingly, the majority nonetheless reject the favorable September 1979 recommendation of the State Bar Court, including the stipulation that the bar’s examiner found acceptable.
The purported reasons for that rejection, stated in the majority’s final paragraph, are (1) that “petitioner continued his misdeeds long after his disbarment” [i.e., from 1971 to 1974], and (2) “[t]hat he finally [in 1974] stopped committing such misconduct does not demonstrate sufficient rehabilitation so as to warrant reinstatement to the practice of law.”
I regret the decision to define rehabilitation so restrictively. Feinstein v. State Bar (1952) 39 Cal.2d 541 [248 P.2d 3] does not, I believe, re*406quire that from the moment of disbarment the petitioner become a paragon of rectitude. Six years of reasonable rectitude should be adequate, I submit.
Bird, C. J., concurred.
Petitioner’s application for a rehearing was denied July 30, 1980.