Reciprocal Suspension For Sex With Client

January 31, 2024

The Minnesota Supreme Court imposed reciprocal discipline of a minimum 90-day suspension based on a sanction imposed by the Iowa Supreme Court.

The Des Moines Register reported on the Iowa matter

A former state public defender who had sex with a client has withdrawn her request to have her law license reinstated in the wake of objections raised by judges and prosecutors.

In late 2022, attorney Kylie M. Liu of Cedar Rapids, agreed to the suspension of her Iowa law license. In an affidavit filed with the Grievance Commission of the Iowa Supreme Court, Liu acknowledged that while working for the State Public Defender’s Office in July 2022, she had engaged in sex with a female client.

After learning from a prosecutor that the client had reported the encounter, Liu withdrew from the woman’s case. In her affidavit, she attributed the encounter to a manic bipolar episode that lasted several weeks, and indicated she had falsely informed her supervisor at the State Public Defender’s Office that a sexual encounter had never occurred.

According to the affidavit, Liu’s family and co-workers requested a welfare check on her in August 2022, after which police found her asleep at her former client’s apartment. Shortly thereafter, Liu informed her employer and the Attorney Disciplinary Board of her relationship with the woman. In her affidavit, Liu stated that she subsequently lost her job with the State Public Defender’s Office as a result of her conduct.

In April 2023, Liu applied for reinstatement of her law license. The University of Iowa’s associate dean for student and career services, as well as Assistant Public Defender Nekeidra Tucker and two other attorneys endorsed her application for reinstatement, attesting to her high moral character.

However, four Iowa judges — District Associate Judges Russell Keast, Angeline Johnston, Cynthia Finley and Casey Jones — wrote a joint letter to the court opposing Liu’s reinstatement.

“Having had significant experience with her appearances in juvenile court, we have found her to be consistently unprepared and seemingly unable to grasp the purpose of, and her role in, any judicial proceeding,” the judges wrote. “Judicial efforts to guide and strengthen her performance have been wholly unsuccessful. Her obvious inability to comprehend the requirement of zealous legal representation has regularly placed her clients at risk of detrimental outcomes. We have not witnessed any level of progress that gives us confidence that she has or can improve.”

In addition, the Linn County Attorney’s Office raised concerns. Assistant County Attorney Matt Kishinami wrote that he felt Liu “would do a tremendous amount of harm to any future clients” if her license was reinstated. He described her as “unskilled at practicing law” and said she appeared to be “incapable of learning.” He added that while many people had tried to educate Liu in the “most simple concepts of law (e.g. the fact that her clients are protected by the Fifth Amendment) and procedure (how appearances work), she simply could not process or retain information.”

Also, Douglas Davis of the State Public Defender’s Office told the court that while his colleague, Tucker, had endorsed Liu’s reinstatement on letterhead from the office, Tucker’s position ran counter to that of the state public defender and other attorneys in the agency’s Cedar Rapids office, all of whom were refraining from taking any position on the issue.

After one of the attorneys who endorsed Liu’s reinstatement withdrew his letter of support, the Attorney Disciplinary Board objected to the application for reinstatement, citing the concerns raised by prosecutors and judges and arguing the application no longer met the state’s minimum requirements for such a request.

Liu then withdrew her application for reinstatement while preserving the right to reapply at a future date.

Liu was first licensed to practice law in Iowa in September 2019.

(Mike Frisch)