Court Opinion

ID: 9545597
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:16:02.835218+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:15:09.334475
License: Public Domain

LINDE, J.,
dissenting.
I respectfully disagree with the sanction imposed by the court.
The Oregon State Bar asserted two reasons for asking us to review the decision of the Trial Panel of the Disciplinary Board. The bar claimed that the accused himself engaged in the practice of law during a period of suspension from practice. Like the Trial Panel, the court finds this charge not proven.
The bar’s second objective is to increase the penalty for the violations that the Trial Panel and the court find to have occurred. The Trial Panel imposed a 45-day suspension, with execution of that sentence suspended for two years during which the accused has to complete a program of education in legal ethics. The majority increases the penalty to an outright suspension for six months, largely upon a finding that the accused aided Delores McElmurry’s improper activities not negligently, as the Trial Board found, but knowingly.
Even so, in my view the period of suspension is too long. It seems to hold the accused accountable not only for aiding McElmurry to perform acts that constituted practicing law without proper qualifications but also for the fact that McElmurry’s conduct proved fraudulent and seriously harmed people who used her services. But the court finds only *314that the accused knew of McElmurry’s unauthorized activities, not that he knew she was defrauding people. Gravity of harm is a factor in assessing a sanction, but it is more directly relevant to the sanction in the usual situation when it results from the lawyer’s own professional failings than when someone else defrauds persons under circumstances that the accused helped to make possible but did not intend or expect.
When that factor is reduced to its proper scope, I believe that the Trial Panel’s sanction was within the appropriate range, although I would make the suspension effective now rather than conditional on future events. I therefore dissent from the length of the suspension ordered by the court.
Jones, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.