Name on Loan To Debt Collection Agency, Attorney Pays Price

The New Jersey Supreme Court imposed a one-year suspension of an attorney “who did not maintain a bona fide attorney-client relationship with [a debt] collection agency, but rather merely loaned his name to it, in exchange for a monthly payment.”

The attorney was admitted in 1965. He maintained a practice at the former business premises of the agency. He has a record of prior discipline of a six-month suspension in 1988 for misconduct as the municipal attorney for Dover Township and a three-month suspension in 2001.

The matter was heard by a special ethics master, who had recommended a two-month suspension. The Disciplinary Review Board (in an 87 page report) had proposed the one-year suspension adopted by the court. (Mike Frisch)