Reinstated

The Ohio Supreme Court has reinstated an attorney who had been suspended in November 2015.

From the initial disciplinary order

In 2011, DeMarco, while representing a plaintiff in a civil suit, entered into an agreement with defense counsel authorizing Jack Harper, a computer expert whom DeMarco had retained, to search the defendants’ electronic devices pursuant to a strict discovery protocol. Under the terms of the protocol, potentially relevant documents were to be delivered to the trial judge “for an in-camera inspection to determine what documents, if any, [would] be turned over to [DeMarco].” Harper thereafter searched the computers of one of the defendants and placed the results of his search on a disc. Harper, however, gave the disc to DeMarco, who reviewed it and determined that none of the documents would be useful for his case. DeMarco never submitted the disc to then trial judge for an in camera inspection.

At a March 2012 pretrial conference, defense counsel asked DeMarco about the results of the computer search, and DeMarco indicated that there was nothing of value in the documents. After defense counsel questioned how DeMarco could have already come to that conclusion, DeMarco stated that Harper had reviewed the documents and told him that there was nothing relevant. DeMarco denied having possession of the disc containing the documents that Harper had retrieved. After the conference, DeMarco telephoned Harper and left a voicemail essentially admitting that he had lied to the court about having the disc. DeMarco then returned the disc to Harper.

The parties resolved their lawsuit in June 2012, and defense counsel requested that Harper return the disc. When Harper refused, the defendants filed a motion to compel. In response, Harper notified the court that he had destroyed the disc. In November 2012, the trial judge held a hearing for Harper to show cause why he should not be held in contempt, and Harper testified that he had given a copy of the disc to DeMarco and that after DeMarco had advised him that the case was over, he had destroyed all media related to the matter.

In response to Harper’s testimony, DeMarco repeated multiple times—both in the judge’s chambers and in open court—that he had never received the disc from Harper and that he had not reviewed documents on the disc. In fact, when responding to Harper’s specific testimony that DeMarco had lied to the court at the March 2012 conference, DeMarco stated that he “would like to go outside with [Harper]” and that he “never lied to anybody, especially to a Court.” Harper, however, then played DeMarco’s voicemail for the judge. After that, the show-cause hearing quickly ended without the judge taking any punitive action against Harper. Defense counsel and the judge later jointly notified relator about DeMarco’s multiple false statements to the court.

The court had imposed a one-year suspension with six months stayed. (Mike Frisch)