Iowa Efficient
The Iowa Supreme Court revoked the license of an attorney charged with misappropriation and dishonesty who had defaulted on the bar’s charges.
Notably (particularly in light of the slow pace of bar process in other places), the Attorney Disciplinary Board filed its charges on March 23, 2016, a hearing was held on August 15 and the entire process was done in time for the holidays.
Bravo Iowa.
The story
[Attorney] Green rented office space from Troy Strawhecker (Strawhecker) and James Myers (Myers) in the name of his company, Third Inning Solutions (3IS, L.L.C.). Strawhecker and Myers are commercial real estate developers in central Iowa and Nebraska. After a few months, Strawhecker and Myers approached Green for help raising equity for a business project. While the majority of the services Green provided to Strawhecker and Myers involved raising equity, he did provide legal services to them on an occasional basis…
He created a company for the clients and made numerous misrepresentations for his own benefit.
When the clients complained
Green wrote the Board a letter in which he generally denied Strawhecker and Myers’s allegations but concluded as follows
However, I no longer live in Iowa. I haven’t practiced law in over four years and my license has been on inactive status for about three years. I have no desire to practice law now or in the future. As such, to save the State of Iowa, the Disciplinary Board and all of the parties’ time and resources (of which I don’t have any), I am willing to voluntarily give up my law license in perpetuity to resolve this matter.
The bar nonetheless proceeded with charges and the attorney failed to respond
Because Green failed to file an answer to the Board’s complaint, the facts as set forth by the Board in the complaint were admitted. Strand, 841 N.W.2d at 603. Pertinently, the complaint states that Green “had a history of providing legal assistance/advice” to Strawhecker and Myers and that “Green entered into a business transaction with his clients without fully disclosing to the clients the true terms of the arrangement in writing.” Additionally, the complaint alleges that Green misrepresented that the legal entity created by him that would be entering into the relationship with GMS (i.e., Holdings) was one in which Green, Strawhecker, and Myers would have an equal interest. Instead, the entity created by Green that contracted with GMS (i.e., Capital) was solely owned by Green.
Thus, Green made representations to Strawhecker and Myers that were intended to mislead them into thinking an entirely different business entity was created. Green misled Strawhecker and Myers into believing they were creating a business entity with Green and they would share equally in the business income and profits. In reality, Green created a separate business entity that only named him and his wife as members with rights to share in the business income and profits. For months, Green represented to Strawhecker and Myers that he was performing CEO duties on behalf of Holdings. Although they repeatedly requested documents and accountings, Green refused to produce documents.
Further, Green misappropriated all of the revenue under the fraudulent entity (Capital) for himself, disbursing little or nothing to Strawhecker and Myers. The revenue made from the management agreement with GMS was not received by Holdings, but was all misappropriated to the entity controlled by Green, Capital. After Green dishonestly and fraudulently received the monthly payments under the agreement, Green misappropriated all of the funds for his own use. None of the money remained in Capital by the time Strawhecker and Myers learned of the misappropriation. We agree with the commission. We hold that the Board proved a violation of rule 32:8.4(c) by a convincing preponderance of the evidence and that there was a misappropriation of funds.
The court declined to apply issue preclusion based on related civil proceedings.
In terms of timeline contrast, note that the web page of the District of Columbia Bar lists the following scheduled hearing
In re Ephraim C. Ugwuonye, DNos. 098-05, et al.
May 16 & 17, 2017, 9:30 a.m.
Courtroom II
It appears that charges arising from complaints that began in early 2005 have apparently been approved for some time and will not even be heard until next May!
One might conclude that efficiency in discharging a public protection obligation is accorded an extraordinarily low priority in the Nation’s Capital. (Mike Frisch)