The Second Time Around
The North Carolina State Bar has filed disciplinary charges against a prominent Raleigh attorney. who had been reinstated after a federal conviction.
WRAL.com reported on the recent charges
Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman has asked the State Bureau of Investigation to look into possible criminal conduct by a high-profile Raleigh defense attorney.
The North Carolina State Bar filed a complaint last month against Johnny Gaskins, alleging that he forged the signatures of his clients on a $23,000 settlement check in a 2015 traffic accident and deposited the money in his personal bank account. The complaint alleges that Gaskins never informed the clients of the settlement, instead telling them that it could take up to two years to settle their injury claims.
The complaint alleges Gaskins’ actions violated several rules of professional conduct for attorneys, and the State Bar is seeking disciplinary action against him.
No criminal charges have been filed in the case, and no date has been set for a State Bar hearing on the matter.
Gaskins didn’t return phone calls Thursday seeking comment.
Gaskins has represented such clients as Amanda Hayes, who was convicted three years ago of helping her husband kill his ex-wife, Laura Ackerson, and dispose of her dismembered body in Texas; Adam Sapikowski, who pleaded guilty in 2008 to killing his parents and leaving their bodies in the family’s Chapel Hill home while he went to his high school prom; Tony Johnson, who was involved in a shooting at a 2004 tailgate party at a North Carolina State University football game that left two men dead; and Kawame Mays, who killed Raleigh police Officer Paul Hale in 1997.
The State Bar complaint isn’t Gaskins’ first legal problem. He was convicted in 2010 of trying to evade Internal Revenue Service rules by structuring bank deposits to avoid reporting requirements. He spent one day in jail, nine months in a halfway house and three years on probation in that case.
The same source had covered the attorney’s 2010 conviction
A Raleigh defense attorney who tried to hide bank deposits from the Internal Revenue Service will serve one day in prison and nine months in a halfway house.
Johnny Sherwood Gaskins, who was sentenced in federal court on Monday, will spend three years on probation.
Investigators said Gaskins structured deposits at several RBC Centura banks to avoid federal income reporting laws. A federal indictment said Gaskins made numerous deposits, each just shy of $10,000, totaling more than $350,000 over a two-year period.
Deposits of more than $10,000 must be accompanied by a currency transaction report, which alerts the government of high streams of income that do not have a clear source.
Gaskins gained fame defending high-profile clients like Adam Sapikowski, the Chapel Hill teenager convicted of fatally shooting his parents in 2006.
Those in the legal community also credit Gaskins’ skills as an attorney for getting a life prison sentence for Kawame Mays, a man convicted of shooting and killing Raleigh police officer Paul Hale in 1997.
The attorney had been suspended for at least two years as a result of the conviction and reinstated in 2013.
Public member David L. Williams dissented on sanction
As the public member of the panel, I have no formal legal training and no experience in legal writing. Accordingly, my dissent may contain errors of a legal nature that are obvious to trained legal professionals, but errors of which I am oblivious.
When on a panel I try to be reasonable, fair, respectful and mindful that the purpose of professional discipline is to protect the public, the courts and the legal profession. In my opinion, the public, the courts and the legal professional have no need of protection from Mr. Johnny S. Gaskins, the defendant in this matter. I would impose no discipline in this matter.
(Mike Frisch)