Fourth Time No Charm But No Suspension Either

A fourth brush with the disciplinary system drew a public censure from the New Jersey Supreme Court.

The attorney and his former client had a fee dispute that went to arbitration.

The attorney had not kept records of his time as reported by the Disciplinary Review Board

At the ethics hearing, respondent admitted that the invoices that he had compiled for the fee arbitration proceeding did not reflect contemporaneous time records and that he had no such records. He told the panel that he had re-created the time spent on the case by reviewing the file, as well as some documents and information on a laptop computer and on an “electronic calendar.” He explained that he had no “supporting documents” or “records from the computer” because of a September 2011 computer crash. He added that, for certain periods between September 2006 through January 2009, he had been unable to recreate the time spent on the file, either because he had found nothing on the file to back it up or because, as a sole practitioner, he had had no time “to look hard enough.”

The DRB

this is not the first time that he has run afoul of the recordkeeping rules. His 2007 reprimand stemmed from recordkeeping violations and were responsible for his negligent misappropriation of client’s funds. Having been disciplined for deficient accounting practices, respondent should have been especially attentive to the proper maintenance of his attorney records.

The attorney also failed to supervise non-lawyer assistants and pursued frivolous claims in seeking to challenge the arbitration award. (Mike Frisch)