No Second Bite Where Attorney Defaults In Bar Case

The District of Columbia Court of Appeals has imposed the reciprocal discipline of disbarment based on the attorney’s disbarment in North Carolina.

The attorney had contended in the D.C. proceeding that he was denied due process in North Carolina and that there were infirmities in the proof of misconduct.

The problem was that he had failed to participate in the North Carolina proceedings

The problem with all these arguments is that respondent may not elect to forgo his disciplinary hearing [in North Carolina] and then complain that certain evidence should have been presented there…While evidence or arguments about what respondent alleges was [his contract paralegal] Driscoll‟s responsibility (for what he refers to as the “train wreck” at his firm) might have affected the Hearing Commission‟s conclusions about the degree of respondent‟s culpability, this was evidence respondent was free to advance at the hearing. Instead, the evidence at the disciplinary hearing was effectively uncontested, and we have no reason “not to respect [the] decision” of the Hearing Commission. (citation omitted)

In reciprocal proceedings, the attorney must show by clear and convincing evidence that an exception to the rule mandating identical sanction has been met.

The court here concluded that the attorney failed to do so. (Mike Frisch)