Court Opinion

ID: 9543846
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:49:45.71034+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:11:18.045653
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
dissenting from today’s sanction of public censure.
The court holds today that public censure cum quarterly supervision will suffice as discipline for a lawyer who violated several of the Oklahoma Rules of Professional Conduct [ORPC]1 and had previously received three private reprimands.2 I cannot agree with the measure of discipline imposed. The court’s public reprimand of a “deeply scarred”3 lawyer, blemished by earlier brushes with the disciplinary system, is much too mild a sanction. No lawyer who has been evaluated psychologically as seriously impaired should be allowed to practice law without day-by-day supervision.
As I counseled in State ex rel. Oklahoma Bar Ass’n v. Wolfe, 919 P.2d 427, 435-36 (Okla.1996) (Opala, J., dissenting), a psychologically impaired legal practitioner must undergo meaningful evaluation at the disciplinary period’s beginning and at its end as well as be subjected to strict supervision, if, as here, probation may be indicated. This much is a sine qua non public safety requirement. In keeping with the new, tougher policy for repeat offenders, which I advocated in Wolfe, Prather should be closely watched to protect his clientele from his disorder’s harmful consequences.
On August 31, 1995 Prather was charged with six separate counts of violating the ORPC.4 He entered, with the Oklahoma Bar Association, into stipulated findings of fact and conclusions of law which submit as admitted and agreed that (1) Prather had received three earlier private reprimands, (2) he is suffering from Adult Attention Deficit Disorder [ADD] which may be considered as a mitigating factor in his case and (3) he be disciplined by public reprimand.
*32In short, because Prather suffers from ADD, he asked that the court lessen his discipline. The psychiatrist, who diagnosed him in March 1995, said that without appropriate medication, behavioral modification or coordination between his work, family and himself, it would be extraordinarily difficult for him to finish tasks or to absorb the information necessary to function adequately. The court declines to treat Prather’s ADD diagnosis as a legal defense to the counts, but does note, in mitigation, that he is presently undergoing a program of treatment.5
Until Prather should convincingly demonstrate — over an appreciable period of time— that he can serve his clients and control his disorder, I would visit upon him a much stricter discipline than that adopted today. Aside from day-to-day supervision, periodical psychological evaluations should be ordered to provide the bar’s general counsel with the data necessary to evaluate his condition’s stability and his treatment’s progress as well as to determine if he is fit to practice under less than daily supervision. Basie concerns for public safety demand that Prather’s conduct of his law practice as well as the progress to be achieved by the therapy designed for him to minimize the detrimental impact of the diagnosed disorder on Prather’s fitness to practice law be carefully and closely monitored.
A much more intrusive form of severe prophylactic discipline should be visited upon this “deeply scarred” repeat offender.

. The Oklahoma Bar Association and Prather stipulated that his actions were in violation of Oklahoma Rules of Professional Conduct, 5 O.S. 1991 Ch.l, App. 3-A Rule 1.1, 1.3, 1.4, and 3.2.

. Prather received on February 25, 1994 a private reprimand from the Professional Responsibility Commission for the offense of neglecting a client, on April 25, 1992 from this court for a violation that consists of neglect, and on December 7, 1990 from the Professional Responsibility Commission for a breach of trust.

. By the phrase “deeply scarred” I refer to those legal professionals who have been significantly affected by substance abuse or by destructive psychological forces. See State ex rel. Oklahoma Bar Ass’n v. Wolfe, 919 P.2d 427, 435 (Olka.1996) (Opala, J., dissenting).

. See supra note 1.

. See State ex rel. Oklahoma Bar Ass’n v. Busch, 919 P.2d 1114 (Okla.1996).