One Is A Lawyer Named Lawless

It being Oscar time, the Pennsylvania Disciplinary Board has named its Top Five Respondents of the Year:

Each year we review five cases decided in the Pennsylvania disciplinary system deemed, in the sole and unappealable discretion of the Editor, to be the most significant cases of the year. We look for cases that present issues which have not often arisen, especially ones reflecting new developments in practice such as technology. We also look at high-profile cases, such as those involving public officials or judicial misconduct.

This year, we found the following cases of particular interest:

1. James Paul Carbone, No. 71 DB 2014 (August 12, 2015).

   Carbone was disbarred based on prosecutorial misconduct committed in his official role Venango County assistant district attorney. Carbone misrepresented his contacts with witnesses to a court, argued his personal opinion on a defendant’s guilt to a jury, and engaged in an ex parte contact with a defendant. Aggravating factors included his refusal to participate in disciplinary proceedings and his betrayal of his position as a public officer.

2. John J. Koresko IV, No. 119 DB 2013 (September 4, 2015)

   Koresko was disbarred for misconduct committed in various proceedings which flowed from his sale of a home to a former co-worker. Based on his belief that a second mortgage was not valid, he neither disclosed nor satisfied the mortgage, leading to years of litigation Koresko himself described as “nuclear war.” The Disciplinary Board found that he filed meritless claims and appeals, obstructed discovery, engaged in conflicts of interest, made misrepresentations to courts and other parties, and committed various acts of misconduct toward opposing and third parties. He never admitted any fault in the matter.

3. William N. Renwick, No. 153 DB 2013 (May 14, 2015)

   Renwick was suspended for two years based on his use of another attorney’s CM/ECF (Case Management/Electronic Case Filing) account to file pleadings in the United States Bankruptcy Court. The account was one of a suspended attorney with whom Renwick engaged as a paralegal. Renwick did not have his own CM/ECF account and did not complete the training required to have an account. He also made false statements to the court about his relationship with the suspended attorney and his use of the account.

4. Thomas M. Nocella, No. 152 DB 2013 (October 20, 2015)

   Nocella, who served as a judge on the Philadelphia Municipal Court and the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, was disbarred after he was removed from the bench and barred from judicial office by the Court of Judicial Discipline. The Disciplinary Board concluded that Nocella had violated several of the Rules of Professional Conduct in a series of knowingly false statements and failures to disclose required information in evaluation questionnaires submitted to the Philadelphia Bar Association Commission on Judicial Selection and Retention, including the facts that he was a defendant in numerous actions, that IRS liens and judgments had been entered against him, that he had filed a petition for bankruptcy, and that he had received an informal admonition as discipline.

5. Joseph F. Lawless, No. 177 DB 2013 (June 25, 2015).

   In a prior disciplinary case, Lawless entered into a Joint Petition in Support of Discipline on Consent, which provided that he would receive a year and a day suspension stayed in its entirety by two years of probation. The terms of the probation required that he abstain from alcohol, drugs or other mind-altering chemicals, and that he maintain weekly telephone contact and twice monthly meetings with a sobriety monitor.

Lawless failed to keep up with the required schedule of contacts. His sobriety monitor warned in May that he was “not taking this seriously.” By January 2015, his monitor reported that he received only one telephone call from Lawless in December, and in February he reported no further contact since that call. In a voicemail left with the sobriety monitor in April, Lawless admitted to a relapse.

Based on his violation of the terms of probation, Lawless’s probation was revoked and he was suspended for a year and a day.

No report on whether the selections reflect the diversity of the Keystone state Bar. (Mike Frisch)