Court Opinion

ID: 9772129
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:08:18.398791+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:42.251178
License: Public Domain

RENDLEN, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
The separate opinion of Blackmar, J. ably addresses the defects in the principal opinion’s conclusion regarding respondent’s competency in bankruptcy. There are, however, other basic flaws in the majority’s factual statements regarding the circumstances surrounding respondent’s failure to file complainant’s bankruptcy petition. This Court’s independent role in reviewing evidence in attorney disciplinary cases provides no license to disregard testimony riddled with contradictions and inconsistencies. The majority accepts at face value and ultimately relies in substantial part for its reprimand upon the allegations of inaction by respondent between June 1981 and March 1982. Little attention is given to the crucial chronology of that ten-month period and the patent confusion of the complainant’s testimony as shown in the following evidence:
The beginning of the attorney-client relationship was established by a canceled check constituting initial payment to respondent on June 17, 1981 although complainant’s testimony vacillated between June and March as the point of beginning. Complainant at another place testified that she paid the balance of her fee in July, however, a canceled check establishes the date as October 27. The evidence shows complainant’s awareness of a balance due on her fee, but a misunderstanding that the filing of her bankruptcy petition was contingent upon full payment of the fee. Complainant’s testimony was also conflicting on the question of whether she signed a standardized “contract” for legal services which made clear this requirement. Respondent sent a letter to complainant on September 23 notifying her that progress on the case awaited payment of the fee. The letter is part of the record, though complainant contended nonreceipt of the letter — a problem she apparently encountered with other incoming mail because of her children.
The fee arrangement in this case was a usual one and it is assumed in the Master’s *507Report and by the majority that no duty arose on the part of respondent until the final October 27 payment. Unfortunately, neither the master nor the majority further review the evidence as to matters where it favors respondent.
Respondent had previously encountered difficulty with the original payment on her fees when complainant’s bank briefly delayed payment of complainant’s initial check. Understandably respondent waited until the second check “cleared” on November 9 before resuming her activity on this case. Respondent testified that within a day or two after that date, complainant’s daughter, angry over the remaining delay called and terminated the attorney-client relationship on behalf of her mother. Complainant herself called later that day with the same message. This significant time frame is the brief period from November 9 to the date of the phone calls. Also of prime importance is the fact that during the same period complainant called respondent several times and expressed doubts (for reasons not related to the alleged delay) about going forward with the bankruptcy. Complainant’s lack of urgency is further shown during the next months where respondent made good faith attempts to arrange meetings with complainant at respondent’s office in order to return complainant’s files and money, only to have complainant fail to appear on several scheduled appointments. Complainant admitted her failure to appear for at least one such appointment and confirmed canceling the contract for respondent’s services. When asked the date of cancellation, she first stated March 1982, then extended her estimate to sometime in 1982 before settling on “possibly" January 1982 as the time the termination of the attorney-client relationship occurred and there is no doubt that $200 of the amount advanced on fees was returned by respondent March 24, 1981. Neither complainant nor the Bar Committee raised an issue regarding return of the amount advanced on fees, yet the majority opinion complains of the delay without recounting the substantial evidence relevant to the issue, including the complainant’s apparent problems with the mail. The same can be said of the majority’s conclusion that respondent failed to diligently pursue complainant’s legal interests. The slender thread of evidence supporting that conclusion is the unspoken assumption that complainant did not discharge respondent until January of 1982 as contrasted the testimony of respondent that this occurred in November. Given the glaring and repeated inconsistencies in complainant’s testimony, and the dearth of evidence pointing to bad faith of any kind I submit this record does not demonstrate a need for reprimand by this Court. Before we issue an order permanently marking this attorney’s record with its corresponding cloud on reputation we must not only carefully examine all the evidence but measure the performance against the realities of the daily demands upon a busy practitioner’s time, nor lose sight of the clearly recognizable fact that complainant was a difficult client given to change on whim and with a less than consistent memory.
In fairness, it must be noted that the memories of both complainant and respondent could not have been aided by the three years delay before the Twenty-second Judicial Circuit Bar Committee held a formal hearing on this matter. Complainant did little to make matters easy or fully cooperate during her relationship with respondent, and all these things clearly made it difficult for respondent to effectively serve her client. DR 2-lll(C)(l)(d). Finally in our “after the fact view” of this record we should be mindful that notwithstanding the difficult client with whom she had to deal, respondent devoted considerable effort and time to a cause for which in the end she received little compensation.
Under the circumstances I cannot concur with the order of reprimand issued by this Court today.