Cover Up Worse Than Crime

A  censure by the New Jersey Supreme Court is based on these findings by the Disciplinary Review Board

respondent was admitted to practice in 2013. In January 2014, respondent began her employment with the law firm Bright & Sponder, in-house counsel for Citizens United Reciprocal Exchange (CURE), an automobile insurance company. She handled a large and demanding caseload of personal injury protection arbitrations and actions. In December 2014, after less than a year in her position, respondent was ticketed for driving while intoxicated (DWI) after a night out with friends. She tried to hide the incident from her employer, due to her fear that her employment would be terminated. During the next five months, respondent appeared in court on multiple occasions, each time expecting the matter to be resolved. With each adjournment, respondent continued to keep the matter from her employer, believing it would be resolved with the next court appearance.

In April 2015, respondent entered a guilty plea and the judge suspended her driver’s license for three months, through July 28, 2015. Respondent feared that, if she stopped submitting monthly mileage reimbursement requests, her employer would become aware of the circumstances leading to her driver’s license suspension. Therefore, from April through July 2015, respondent submitted falsified monthly mileage expense reimbursement forms, and accepted those reimbursements from her employer.

In September 2015, Bright & Sponder discovered inaccurate mileage entries, and informed respondent that it believed a number of her entries had been falsified. At that time, she readily admitted the deception and offered to repay the excess amount she had received as reimbursement. The firm declined her reimbursement offer, but terminated her employment. Respondent remains willing to make repayment.

Respondent admitted that, over the course of five months, she falsified mileage reimbursement forms to conceal the loss of her driver’s license, stemming from her DWI conviction. Although respondent was not motivated by financial gain, but, rather by the fear of potential job loss if her employer discovered her driver’s license suspension, she kept the monies received as a result of her false reporting. Respondent’s misrepresentations violated RPC 8.4(c).

(Mike Frisch)