No More Special Privileges

The Oklahoma Supreme Court has disbarred an attorney

Respondent claims, and witnesses agree, that he practiced law for more than twenty years without incident. However, by 2019, Respondent was the subject of several interactions with police, including welfare checks, domestic and property disputes, and traffic stops. Most witnesses who knew Respondent testified to his deterioration and believed it was due at least in part to his drug use. In late 2019, Respondent’s assistant prepared and delivered case paperwork to Respondent’s house because he stopped coming to his office; he also asked her to bring a gun to keep in the office. On one occasion Associate District Judge Duck contacted the assistant after Respondent missed a court appearance and had her bring that paperwork and all Respondent’s deprived child cases to him. Eventually, Judge Duck told her to close Respondent’s law office.

Leading to a series of criminal matters

CM-2020-56 (Driving While Under the Influence of Intoxicants)

On February 29, 2020, Respondent was stopped for crossing double yellow lines, expired tag, and apparently arguing with a passenger. The officer observed that Respondent had erratic behavior, was agitated and appeared paranoid; the officer suspected Respondent was under the influence of an intoxicant. Respondent first suggested to the traffic officer that “there are certain people that you do not arrest”, then failed field sobriety tests.

CM-2020-192 (Violating a Protective Order)

Respondent’s former partner, G.S., obtained a permanent protective order directing Respondent to (a) stay away from G.S. and her children, and (b) to surrender his firearms and dangerous weapons. While out on bond for the DUI, Respondent tried to communicate with G.S. and was charged with a violation of permanent protective order on June 26, 2020. He failed to appear, forfeited his bond, was arrested, and was released on July 8 to undergo inpatient treatment for addiction. After treatment concluded, he was released upon a payment of $25,000. The protective order was dismissed during the pendency of this case, on April 8, 2022.

CM-2021-206 (Possession of Methamphetamine and Paraphernalia)

On July 21, 2021, during a traffic stop, Respondent’s passenger had an active warrant, and drugs on his person. Ultimately this led to a search of Respondent’s car. The officer found loose pills as well as glass pipes and a baggie with methamphetamine residue in Respondent’s console and his bag. He was charged with possession of methamphetamine and unlawful possession of paraphernalia, posted bond, and was released.

CM-2021-224 (Possession of Methamphetamine, Possession of Paraphernalia, Obstructing an Officer)

On July 28, 2021, Sulphur police were called to Respondent’s home for a welfare check. Events resulting from that check are discussed later in this Opinion, in connection with a Rule 6 allegation. However, officers eventually executed a search warrant and entered the house by breaking a window. The next day, on July 29, Respondent’s mother asked his friend Foltz to check on Respondent. Foltz went to the house but could not reach Respondent. Foltz entered through the window police had broken the previous day, and Respondent repeatedly hit him with a baseball bat. Foltz went to the hospital and Respondent called police to report a burglary in progress.² Officers arrived, found no burglary, and went to the hospital to interview Foltz. Respondent was arrested because of Foltz’s injuries; in the search incident to arrest police found methamphetamine and pipes with methamphetamine residue. Respondent was charged with possession of both methamphetamine and paraphernalia, and obstructing an officer.³

Respondent pled guilty in each misdemeanor case. Respondent received a cumulative sentence of 90 days in jail and five years in prison deferred, plus one year suspended, all running concurrently to one another, along with fines.

In addition to a number of practice-related issues

On July 21, 2021, Respondent was arrested for possession of methamphetamine and paraphernalia (CM-2021-206, above) and bonded out. On July 28, Judge Duck called police to perform a welfare check on Respondent. In response, officers Conyers and Calabrese went to Respondent’s house, as they had done in the past to perform other welfare checks. They found two sheriff’s deputies, Flowers and Eddy, already there. Respondent’s friend Foltz arrived, and officers asked him to wait for them down the road, away from the house. Most of the doors were barricaded. From previous visits, officers knew there was an interior garage door that led into the house. They went into the garage and saw a string hanging from the doorknob that led up, over the door, and back into the house. Deputies touched the string but did not open the door. Flowers talked to Foltz, asking where Respondent was and why there was a string around the door. Foltz became upset and said he’d forgotten, but the string was a booby trap, attached to the trigger of a shotgun inside the house that was pointed at the doorway. Officers secured the house, left, and returned with a search warrant. Afraid that any nonbarricaded doors would have similar traps, they broke the front window and found the loaded shotgun, set up to fire at anyone coming through the interior garage door. Under the terms of the protective order then in effect, Respondent had been ordered to give up any guns he possessed. The officers testified that preparation of this lethal booby trap posed a danger to them as they tried to carry out the welfare check, and its discovery adversely affected two officers’ mental health. Respondent was neither arrested nor charged because of this incident. When asked about it during his PRT hearing, he first said he did not wish to discuss the circumstances leading up to it, then stated he did not want to open himself to potential criminal liability and invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to answer questions.

The court ordered disbarment

Consistently throughout the Rule 6 and Rule 7 proceedings, Respondent has tried to minimize the nature of his actions, civil and criminal, and their consequences to both his clients and the profession. In his criminal proceedings as well as this disciplinary proceeding Respondent has used his status as a lawyer to argue for, and receive, special privileges. Time after time Murray County law enforcement gave Respondent lenient treatment in traffic stops and welfare checks, despite his erratic and occasionally violent actions. The Murray County District Attorney’s office dismissed a felony charge, allowed Respondent to plead to deferred sentences, agreed to modify those sentences so they could be discharged while these disciplinary proceedings were pending, and then dismissed the cases to give Respondent a perceived advantage in these proceedings. Respondent has suggested to both the PRT and this Court that clients who complained about him, either to Judge Duck or the OBA, were neither unhappy nor harmed by his actions. He has refused to address the serious charge involving the shotgun in Count V, instead invoking the Fifth Amendment. While admitting he engaged in the unauthorized practice of law, he suggested the problem was really his failure to complete MCLE hours, not the unauthorized representation. He has consistently failed to show the good judgment we expect of a lawyer.

Dissents would impose a lesser sanction