Court Opinion

ID: 9703066
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 23:38:24.209911+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:45.164828
License: Public Domain

*449O’HERN, J.,
dissenting.
Three members of the Disciplinary Review Board (DRB) voted for a six-month suspension of respondent, rather than disbarment. Those members believed that the proofs did not clearly and convincingly establish that there had been a knowing misappropriation of clients’ funds within the meaning of In re Wilson, 81 N.J. 451, 409 A.2d 1158 (1979). I agree with the dissenting members of the DRB and do not vote to disbar the respondent.
The crucial issue is the claimed misappropriation of the Hill-crest funds. Respondent testified that in May 1990 he drew a $7,500 check from his trust account to cover expenses of his father’s real estate business. He intended to obtain the funds from his father that same evening before the check was presented for payment. Respondent’s failing was not that he was venal, but that he did not bring himself to discuss the cover of the cheek with his father while his father was mourning the loss of his wife. As respondent explained the situation:
It’s in the middle of the day, the broker from Hillcrest comes over and says I’m going to have to pay bills tomorrow; now, I’ve got a choice, my dad is in bad shape, I can pickup [sic] the phone, this is the way I’m reconstructing it, I can pickup [sic] it again and say dad, hop in your truck and get a check up here for $Y500 or I can hand the check over, go home that night, pick the proper moment to tell him, he will write it, bring it up, put it in the bank and the money is never out of the account, for whatever reason I did not do that.
Thus, when respondent drew the check he did not know that there would be an invasion of client funds. He believed the check would be covered. When he went to his father’s home that evening to get the covering check from his father (who was fully able to cover the $7,500), he found his father in a disconsolate state over the recent, tragic death of his wife in an automobile accident. For whatever reason, sympathy or his own grief over his mother’s death, respondent did not attend to business. He never found “the proper moment.” Did that display of humanity make Walter Roth a thief? There must be more to the Wilson rule than this. Yes, respondent waited several months to correct the situation, but he, too, was in the grips of a deep depression, not induced solely by the death of his mother, but surely not *450alleviated by it. As his associate from 1986 to 1989 explained: “[A] lot of times [respondent] would sit in his office with just a banker’s lamp on, not the overhead lights, just sit and stare off into space * *
Insistence on proof that an attorney’s
personal suffering caused him to misappropriate funds is both unrealistic and pointless. Our human experience is sufficient to infer a relationship between severe personal stress and acts of imprudence or even desperation. The question should not be one of causation, but rather whether our disciplinary system is sufficiently flexible in unique circumstances to temper the imposition of discipline by taking into account the influence of extraordinary events.
[In re Bell, 126 N.J. 261, 269, 596 A.2d 752 (1991) (Stein, J., concurring in part, dissenting in part).]
It should so be in this case as well. The confluence of human events — the death of a mother, the grief of a father, the depression of the respondent — should be taken into account, especially considering that no client suffered any loss on account of respondent’s conduct.
For disbarment — Chief Justice WILENTZ, and Justices HANDLER, POLLOCK, GARIBALDI, STEIN and COLEMAN — 6.
For suspension — Justice O’HERN — 1.
ORDER
It is ORDERED that WALTER L. ROTH, JR., of PITMAN, who was admitted to the bar of this State in 1979, be disbarred, effective immediately; and it is further
ORDERED that respondent’s name be stricken from the roll of attorneys and that he be permanently restrained and enjoined from practicing law; and it is further
ORDERED that all funds, if any, currently existing in any New Jersey financial institution maintained by WALTER L. ROTH, JR., pursuant to Rule 1:21-6, shall be restrained from disbursement except upon application to this Court, for good cause shown, and shall be transferred by the financial institution to the Clerk of *451the Superior Court, who is directed to deposit the funds in the Superior Court Trust Fund, pending further Order of this Court; and it is further
ORDERED that respondent reimburse the Disciplinary Oversight Committee for appropriate administrative costs incurred in the prosecution of this matter.