No Moral Turpitude When Delusional Attorney Kidnaps Mother And Pepper Sprays Caretaker
A bar discipline summary from the November 2016 California Bar Journal
JEANNIE E. TANAKA [#116289], 74, of Los Angeles, was suspended from the practice of law for two years and placed on four years’ probation. She must comply with all conditions of probation in an underlying criminal matter including the requirement that she seek treatment by a psychiatrist and comply with a protective order. She must pass the State Bar Ethics School test and pass the MPRE. The order took effect June 18, 2016.
Tanaka’s discipline followed her criminal conviction for attempted kidnapping, battery and attempting to evade police while driving a vehicle. Those events arose from her attempt to take her aged mother from her sister’s home, following a longstanding family dispute, despite prior court orders prohibiting Tanaka from visiting her mother without notice and the presence of a monitor during visits.
Tanaka pepper-sprayed a caretaker and left with her mother, driving recklessly. The State Bar Court determined that Tanaka’s acts involved misconduct but not moral turpitude, based on previous case outcomes. In aggravation, Tanaka committed multiple acts of misconduct, showed dishonesty and lack of candor and caused harm to the public. She demonstrated lack of insight and recognition into her misconduct. In mitigation, Tanaka had 27 years of discipline-free practice.
The report of the Hearing Department is linked here.
After the mother and Respondent exited the house and were headed for Respondent’s rental car, the caretaker physically sought to impede the mother’s progress toward the car. However, Respondent, who had come to the residence with two canisters of pepper spray, responded by pulling one of the canisters from the fanny pack she was wearing and spraying the caretaker in the face, including the eyes and the back of the head. After then shouting unsuccessfully for help, the caretaker ran to the street, where she was able to get the attention of the driver of a car, who then called 911 and asked that the police go immediately to the location of the dispute.
The caretaker then ran back to where mother was in the process of getting into the rental car. Committed to protecting the mother, the caretaker jumped into the rental car and refused to leave, despite Respondent’s demands that she do so. However, before Respondent could drive the rental car away, the police arrived. On exiting squad car, the uniformed officers ordered Respondent to stop. She did not. Instead, she backed the car into the street and drove away. The police officers quickly returned to their patrol vehicle and pursued Respondent’s vehicle, using lights and sirens to signal Respondent to stop. Respondent, who was aware of the pursuing police vehicle with its lights and sirens, did not voluntarily stop.
[After a wild ride] On being taken into custody, it was determined that Respondent had packed food, water, clothes, and more than $43,000 in cash in the rental car prior to driving to pick up her mother.
A variety of explanations were rejected such as the attorney was serving a subpoena on her mother and
During the trial of this matter, Respondent sought to explain her failure to comply with the red lights and sirens of the police vehicle by suggesting that she believed the police were somehow providing her with a police escort to the courthouse. That explanation is clearly erroneous and was either a deliberate attempt by Respondent to mislead this court or the product of a delusional view by Respondent of what happened. This court concludes that it is the latter. The erratic route traveled by Respondent with her mother was inconsistent with any possible intent to take her mother to testify at trial. More significantly and contrary to Respondent’s testimony, given that Respondent had not had any conversation with the police officers prior to the commencement of the police chase, Respondent had no reason to believe the officers were aware of her alleged intent to drive to the downtown courthouse.
On moral turpitude, the Hearing Department found (after a lengthy and colorful discussion of past crimes of California attorneys as precedent) that the crimes here were not ones of turpitude
While this court agrees that much of Respondent’s testimony regarding the events of December 19, 2011, lacks credibility, it does not find that testimony to result from dishonesty or a lack of candor. Rather, after observing Respondent’s demeanor and assessing her credibility, the court concludes that Respondent’s descriptions and explanations of her actions reflect her own distorted and/or delusional view of her actions and the events of that day…
Respondent’s illegal acts constituted a felony and two separate misdemeanors. In perpetrating those acts, she violated her obligation as an attorney to uphold the law, ignored an order issued by a court, disobeyed an order made by the police, and disregarded the safety of her own mother, the caretaker, and many others. Of greatest concern, she still does not fully recognize the impropriety of her actions.
(Mike Frisch)