A Three-Year Disbarment

A convicted attorney was recently disbarred by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court

1. At the time of the significant events, Mr. Miller was employed by the Social Security Administration and had no private clients.
2. Mr. Miller agrees that he had engaged in misconduct and violated specific portions of the Maine Rules of Professional Conduct for which he should be disciplined by a period of disbarment from practice subject to the Court’s approval under M. Bar R. 25(a).
3. Mr. Miller admits that on July 5, 2017 he was convicted by his plea of guilty to a charge of Accessing With Intent to View Child Pornography in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 2252A(a)(5)(B) and (b)(2), which is a federal felony offense.
4. The Criminal Complaint specifically alleged that Mr. Miller “used a computer and the internet to access digital image files that depicted sexually explicit conduct and were produced using minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct.”
5. Beginning on an unknown date, Mr. Miller used the internet and “peer-to-peer” file sharing networks to search for and download child pornography to his computer.
6. Through his searches, Mr. Miller utilized a computer program which made his IP address visible to others, and made the child pornography which he downloaded available to others over the peer-to-peer network. Miller states that he was unaware that the default settings on the program provided for file “sharing,” and thereby allowed others to access the pornography he had downloaded.
7. Miller’s computer was equipped with a “shredder” program, and as a result, downloaded files were deleted by the computer after viewing, removing the evidence of his ongoing criminal conduct.
8. On or about December 19, 2017 Mr. Miller was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge George Z. Singal to a prison term of 36 months, followed by 10 years of supervised release and a $5,100.00 total financial assessment.
9. Mr. Miller admits that his conduct underlying those criminal convictions constituted violations of M. R. Prof. Conduct 8.4(b), (c), and (d), being criminal conduct that reflects adversely on his honesty, trustworthiness or fitness as a lawyer in other respects, involving dishonesty, as well as being conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice.

The court ordered disbarment for a period of three years. (Mike Frisch)