The Rights Of Rural Clients

The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals has ordered a six-month suspension of an attorney

Over the course of approximately one year, the Office of Lawyer Disciplinary Counsel (ODC) received four separate complaints against Scott A. Curnutte, all relating to his inaction and failure to communicate. When notified of the complaints, Mr. Curnutte engaged with ODC initially, but eventually began ignoring that office just as he had his clients. The formal statement of charges against Mr. Curnutte sought discipline based on the misconduct alleged in the complaints and his failure to communicate with ODC. After a hearing, the Hearing Panel Subcommittee (HPS) of the Lawyer Disciplinary Board (LDB) found that ODC proved the charges and recommended a six-month suspension of Mr. Curnutte’s license, among other things. Mr. Curnutte acknowledges his neglect of ODC’s requests, and he contends that an admonishment is the appropriate sanction for that ethical violation, but he denies that ODC proved the other charged violations. Because we find that all charged misconduct was clearly and convincingly established before the HPS, and due to the presence of several aggravating factors, a six-month suspension of Mr. Curnutte’s law license is called for along with the other sanctions recommended by HPS.

Respondent was admitted in 1991 and practices in Elkins West Virginia

We begin by rejecting Mr. Curnutte’s argument that our determination as to sanction must account for the fact that he practices in a rural community. In Lawyer Disciplinary Board v. Davis, Mr. Davis argued that a six-month suspension was excessive and advanced the same argument as Mr. Curnutte in support of that position. Although we “applaud[ed]” Mr. Davis’s “concern for the legal needs of his community,” we cited to “the need to protect this very community” in imposing a six-month sanction. This is because “[t]he [Rules of Professional Conduct] state the minimum level of conduct below which no lawyer can fall without being subject to disciplinary action.” In other words, the Rules are the floor; the requirements imposed by them are not downwardly adjusted in areas with fewer attorneys. To the contrary, those areas must be protected just the same as more populated ones.

Sanction

A six-month suspension, along with the other sanctions recommended by HPS, is warranted here, too. Mr. Curnutte established a pattern and practice of neglecting his clients’ cases, failing to communicate with them, and failing to take action on their behalf. His failures caused his clients frustration and brought disrepute to the profession. He neglected his responsibilities as a mediator, frustrating both Mr. Kramer and the administration of justice, and he continually ignored lawful requests for information from ODC. Along with the other sanctions recommended by HPS, we find that a six-month  suspension of Mr. Curnutte’s law license is necessary to appropriately punish, to effectively deter other members of the State Bar, and to restore public confidence in the ethical standards of the legal profession.

Chief Justice Wooten concurred and dissented in part

In summary, in my view the LDB failed to present clear and convincing evidence that Mr. Curnutte violated Rule 1.3, Rule 3.2, Rule 3.4(c), or Rule 8.4(a) in the McFarlan, Lambert, and Kramer cases, all of which were complex and time-consuming for reasons unrelated to any fault on the part of Mr. Curnutte. Nonetheless, because Mr. Curnutte violated Rule 1.4(a)(3) & (4) in the McFarlan case, and violated Rule 8.1(b) multiple times in all four of the cases filed against him, I concur with the majority’s conclusion that an admonishment would be an insufficient sanction. I believe that a six-month suspension is unduly harsh, given the facts and circumstances of this case; as noted supra, Mr. Curnutte may have sowed the wind, by virtue of ignoring LDB’s lawful requests for information, but I am not convinced that he should therefore reap the whirlwind. I would require Mr. Curnutte to serve a three-month suspension, with readmission conditioned on his having obtained six hours of continuing legal education (“CLE”) credit in the area of ethics and law office management beyond the three hours required by the CLE Commission for the 2024-26 reporting period, and his retention of a consultant to review his office procedures in order to determine if and how he might better handle his extensive case load, and respond to client inquiries, within a reasonable period of time.

(Mike Frisch)