Forgetting Alzheimer’s Association Leads To Reprimand

The Maine Grievance Commission has issued a stipulated reprimand with one year of supervision for misconduct set forth below

According to the parties’ stipulations, the Commission finds the following relevant facts:

On October 15, 2019, Attorney Nora Baker filed a complaint against Attorney Dionne on behalf of the Alzheimer’s Association. Within her complaint, Attorney Baker alleged that Dionne had contacted the Alzheimer’s Association in August 2014 on behalf of a trust. The Alzheimer’s Association was a 25% beneficiary of the trust. Attorney Baker alleged that Attorney Dionne had failed to pay the Alzheimer’s Association its bequest, and that Attorney Dionne had been unresponsive to communications from the Alzheimer’s Association, including letters and voicemail through October 2019.

The Board sought immediate confirmation from Attorney Dionne that the money due to the Alzheimer’s Association remained in trust for distribution. Attorney Dionne made timely reply to that request confirming that the money did remain in trust. He explained that he was waiting for an executed Authorization from the Alzheimer’s Association before making the distribution.

On November 4, 2019, Attorney Dionne made his full timely response to Attorney Baker’s complaint. In his response, Attorney Dionne explained that in the course of preparing that document he had reviewed the Trust file and an associated file, and realized that he had received and misfiled the Authorization. He acknowledged his mistake.

Attorney Dionne paid the corpus of the bequest from the Trust to the Alzheimer’s Association. Through counsel, he addressed the issue of the lost opportunity caused by the delay in responding to Attorney Baker. Attorney Dionne made an additional payment to the Alzheimer’s Association to satisfy that lost opportunity.

Even though Dionne did not intend to withhold the bequest from the Alzheimer’s Association, the Commission finds that his actions constituted violations of M. R. P. C. (1.3) [diligence] and 8.4(d) [conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice].

The Maine Rules of Professional Conduct specifically require attorneys to uphold their responsibilities to clients and the courts. Attorney Dionne agrees that he violated his duties to comply with those Rules.

Notably, it appears that the order was issued on the very day of the hearing. (Mike Frisch)