Failure to communicate is still #1 offense

Mark Dubois, chief disciplinary counsel for Connecticut state judicial branch, said “The business of law is as important as the practice of law.”

A Connecticut attorney was suspended for 6 months because of his continuous management breaches (4 “strikes” in 5 years). The attorney’s offenses included waiting too long to deposit an escrow check and not returning a client’s phone calls.

In imposing the suspension, the Court had little sympathy for this attorney, saying “At the hearing before this court, (the attorney) stated that he took responsibility for all of the conduct at issue in each grievance and was not contesting the allegations of the Complaint.” But, the Court continued, “Unfortunately, (the attorney) then proceeded to address the court at some length, during which he blamed virtually all of the conduct which formed the basis for each grievance on either `his secretaries’ or one secretary in particular, whose employment he claimed he had terminated. The only remorse he expressed was with respect to his failure to terminate more promptly the offending secretary. More importantly, (the attorney) failed to express any realization of the insidious nature of his conduct in failing to respond to repeated inquiries from clients or others.”

Categorized in: Management