Stayed Suspension For Yelling, Cursing, Pounding Table

One of the recent North Carolina State Bar sanctions reported below involved this behavior that led to a stayed one-year suspension with numerous conditions

On January 24, 2013, [attorney] Jones was in the hallway of the courthouse in Lillington talking to opposing counsel, Chad Wunsch, about a domestic case in which Jones represented the wife. Wunsch’s client was also present. Jones became upset and started yelling and otherwise acting in an unprofessional manner. As a result, Wunsch and his client had to leave the courthouse.

On February 28, 2013, Jones called opposing counsel in a domestic case, Heather Williams, who had filed a sanctions motion to get her client’s attorney fees paid by Jones’ client. Jones told Williams: “I got your f—ing motion.” Jones went on to disparage Williams personally, including saying, “your Dad is well known, but you aren’t sh–.” Williams hung up on Jones but he called back and continued to lambast Williams.

On April 11,2013, Jones attended a mediation involving distribution of assets in a domestic case in which Jones represented the husband. After Jones and opposing counsel gave the mediator the respective positions of the parties, Jones jumped up and stormed into the room where the opposing party was located and screamed at her, pounding his fists on the table and cursing her.

Jones and Gerald Hayes represented opposing parties in a domestic case. After the clients had engaged in a physical altercation, they took out cross warrants against each other. On April 18, 2013, Hayes looked for Jones in the courthouse to get Jones to go with him to dismiss the cross warrants (which is common practice in cases where the parties are represented in a related domestic case). When Hayes found Jones in the lawyers’ lounge and proposed that they should go get rid of the criminal charges, Jones got in Hayes’ face and yelled and cursed at him.

On May 28,2015, LTC David C. Kamka and his wife were in Courtroom 2 in the Harnett County Courthouse as witnesses against a criminal defendant represented by Jones.

At a recess in the court’s proceedings, Jones approached to within two to three feet of the Kamkas, aimed his phone camera at the Kamkas and either took their picture or pretended to do so. The Kamkas believed that Jones did this to intimidate them as potential witnesses or to harass them.

He has stopped taking domestic cases. (Mike Frisch)