hisBackground: Issue of 2017 Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Lawsuit against SBOT
On June 23rd, 2016, the State Bar of Texas (SBOT) and the Sunset Advisory Commission (SAC) met after 7pm to discuss SAC 2016 Report Recommendations. The author of SAC’s 2016 Recommendations Project Manager, Sean Shurleff, was NOT PRESENT. An uninformed and uninterested team leader (Katharine Teleki) mentioned that SAC Report Project Manager, Sean Shurleff, was “unable to attend!” Only a few SAC 2016 Members remained after 7pm; apparently exhausted and bleary eyed.
SBOT’s Executive Director, currently Michelle Hunter, represented SBOT’s Board of Directors made up of volunteers. The current president of the SBOT, Trey Apffel, appeared at the witness table; but sat quietly while Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel’s (CDC) Linda Acevedo absurdly lied to SAC 2016 Members that CDC did not ever receive any Complaints about the Grievance Process. Commission on Lawyer Discipline’s Chief John Neal did NOT explain why Guy Harrison, the prior CLD Chief for six years, who just recently stepped down, did NOT attend the SAC conference (because the state legislature must renew SBOT’s charter or else SBOT will essentially lose its authority to continue operating). NO ONE asked why the chosen SBOT Panel did not have representatives from The Board of Disciplinary Appeals (BODA) (e.g., Chair Marvin W. Jones or his understudy David N. Kitner) and the Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) (e.g., Catherine N. Wylie).
Oddly enough, the Texas Bar did not notify its dues-paying membership of the Sunset Review process. (Wikipedia, 2016) A few “Public” commenters were present to give three minutes of rebut (each) to about four SAC 2016 Members who had not already gone home due to the draining, all day meeting and the lateness of the SBOT session. None of the Commenters drew any questions from the “left-over” SAC 2016 Members.
1. In 2011, Texas Coalition on Lawyer Accountability’s (TCLA’s) major recommendation was for The Supreme Court of Texas to approve and commission an independent and long-overdue assessment of the Texas attorney grievance system.
On June 23rd, 2016, Julie Oliver, TCLA, presented a 3 minute refutation to SBOT’s Acevedo’s inane and certainly FALSE statement that there were “NO COMPLAINTS MADE TO CDC about the Grievance Process. It was so apparent that Chair Larry Gonzales did not COMPREHEND that – the overwhelming defeat of proposed amendments in the referendum vote in early 2011 – was NOT because SBOT’s Membership disagreed among themselves about amendment proposals which SBOT officials intended to promulgate; it was because the mammoth Membership disagreed with the egregious provisions of amendments, presented by SBOT’s professional body of lawyers and appointees of The Supreme Court of Texas responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in their jurisdiction. The Membership “as a whole” rose up against SBOT’s officials and appointees of The Supreme Court, instead – prodigiously siding with TCLA’s Julie Oliver’s and the Public’s Perspective – that SBOT’s proposed amendments “posed significant risk to the interests of clients and the public as a whole.” (Oliver, 2010)
Just a few moments before Julie Oliver’s 3 minute speech to the few remaining SAC 2016 Members (after 7PM), Chair Larry Gonzales demonstrated an alarming confusion in what might have been meant as “instructions” to SBOT officials at the witness table. In a faltering, but seemingly condescending monologue, Chair Gonzales indicated that provisions in the referendum vote in 2011 were OBJECTIONABLE to Members because SBOT had NOT “done its work and gotten the word out.” Per the Chair’s ill-informed, “off the cuff” observance, OBJECTIONS to FUTURE proposed amendments published for comment “might” be mitigated by “better communication” by SBOT’s officials and appointees of The Supreme Court to the nearly 100,000 Mandatory Members.” It is so ironic that the Chair of the SAC 2016 made such confounding comments just before Julie Oliver was seated alone at the witness table.
In fact, it had been SOLELY TCLA’s Executive Director Julie Oliver, rather than any SBOT official, appointee, or supporter, who was the MAJOR COMMUNICATOR to the mammoth Membership mass in 2010 & 2011; providing oral testimony at Public Hearings in 2011 held by SBOT on the proposed amendments that had NOT involved public advocates in the lengthy drafting process. The final draft by The Supreme Court provided for a referendum vote by SBOT’s membership, however, had failed to address provisions abhorrent to the Public (that Ms. Oliver had described in her testimony in Public Hearings). As a result, TCLA advocated for the ENTIRE MEMBERSHIP to vote against all parts of the referendum.
THE MEMBERSHIP OVERWHELMINGLY DEFEATED THE PROPOSED AMENDMENTS IN THE REFERENDUM VOTE IN EARLY 2011. Could Chair Larry Gonzales have missed the FACT that – he is on a FUTILE MISSION that the Mandatory SBOT Membership can be forced to vote for Amendment Provisions that are Client-adverse; and only benefit the interests of SBOT, the TRADE ASSOCIATION, i.e. SBOT has “served” its’ Membership by CONCEALING violations of Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct (TDRPC) and EXPUNGING records of valid Grievances against Respondents in an extremely self-serving effort to keep SBOT members’ premiums for professional liability insurance rates low.
Could Chair Larry Gonzales possibly perceive SAC 2016 might AGAIN propose that SBOT embark on a long process to FORCE any FUTURE referendum vote by “better communication of atrocious, PUBLIC-ADVERSE amendments?” When he cut Ms. Oliver off at the 3rd minute, Mr. Gonzales looked completely baffled. Shamefully, SAC Director Ken Levine must not have known enough about TCLA and the 2011 MISERABLY FAILED REFERENDUM, to correct Chair Gonzales embarrassingly simplistic assertions that yet another “referendum vote” might be wreaked upon the Mammoth Membership in 2017 and become mystically “accepted.” (Did Chair Gonzales also fail to observe that the huge 96,912 Membership had an 80% Voter abstention rate in a recent SBOT election of President and Directors?)
Neither the SAC 2016 Chair or Members nor SAC Director Ken Levine questioned why there was no Chair (Catherine N. Wylie) of the Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) panel at the witness table. Yet, GOC had been charged in 2011 with making recommendations to The Court to improve the Grievance system so that it PROTECTS THE PUBLIC.
In April, 2011, TCLA provided input on behalf of The Public into SBOT’s budget process, citing MAJOR CONCERNS:
▪ seriously declining numbers of disciplinary actions completed against Texas attorneys, despite significant increases in the number of attorneys
▪ programs: CAAP (Client Attorney Assistance Program) and the Ombudsman.
To date, NO ONE has stressed the importance of PROTECTING THE CONCERNS OF CLIENTS IN THE GRIEVANCE PROCESS; except for TCLA’s Julie Oliver (much respected by the Mammoth Membership) who unabashedly stands up to the INCOMPETENT & CORRUPT SBOT officials and appointees of The Supreme Court that are self-serving and lack all integrity.
It is a humiliation that NO ONE on the SAC 2016 Member Panel inquired about GOC’s RECOMMENDATIONS from the 2011 debacle. Demonstrating abject debauchery against The Public, SAC Director Ken Levine (evidenced by the RECOMMENDATIONS in SAC 2016 Report authored by the ABSENT Sean Shurleff) actually purports to EXPAND the egregious CAAP. In addition, - shamefully - it has not yet “come to light” that the Ombudsman program ended abruptly when OCDC’s Ombudsman Maureen Ray mysteriously gave up her Law License in April 2015. SBOT has NOT HIRED ANY LAWYER TO TAKE HER PLACE AT SBOT. (Most likely, NO LAWYER WILL TAKE AN SBOT POSITION IN WHICH THEIR DUTY IS TO EXPLAIN WHY 95% OF ALL GRIEVANCES ACKNOWLEDGED AS RECEIVED BY SBOT, ARE DENIED & DISMISSED; COMPLAINANTS ARE GIVEN NO AMENDMENT OR APPEAL RIGHTS! Therefore, since April, 2015, there is NO ONE at SBOT who has the DUTY to give EXPLANATIONS of the DENIALS, DISMISSALS and EXPUNGEMENTS of 95% of all Grievances acknowledged as received annually by SBOT. One must wonder: has GOC been DISCHARGED by SBOT as well?
In 2011, TCLA’s major recommendation was for The Supreme Court of Texas to approve and commission an independent and long-overdue assessment of the Texas attorney grievance system. NONE HAS EVER BEEN DONE! It is apparent that SAC Chair Gonzales and SAC Director Ken Levine portend to inflict the egregious Grievance system on The Public for another 12 years - based SOLELY on the unusable and misleading Sean Shurleff report and “off the cuff” observances of disinterested SAC Members and Legislators.
2. Sean Shurleff’s SAC 2016 Report is useless. SAC 2016 Members directed, instead, to the SAC 2003 Report Recommendations to find answers to why SBOT’s Grievance Process is DYSFUNCTIONAL.
Debbie G. Asbury, Statfoundation.com, (Asbury, 2011) presented a rebut that Sean Shurleff’s SAC 2016 Report Recommendations (which were haphazardly “passed along” by SAC Director Ken Levine) were so uninformative and distorted that SAC 2016 Members would do Texans a favor to just discard the current Report and refer to the SAC 2003 Report to find answers to why SBOT’s Grievance Process is DYSFUNCTIONAL. (SAC Chair Larry Gonzales cut me off after 3 minutes and did not ask questions to draw out the remainder of my 5 minute speech. A bewildered-looking Chair Gonzales did acknowledge the plethora of writings, Reports and full documentations that I had presented to SAC 2016.)
3. SBOT’s Exploitative Ruses, effectuated 1/1/2004; after Implementation of SAC 2003 Complainant-adverse Changes, has generated significant legal LIABILITY to SBOT Board Members – including, potentially, treble damages and criminal (Texas Legislators MUST IMMEDIATELY consider whether to provide for the defense and indemnification of boards and board members.)
Rich Robins, a Texas attorney, presented a refute (from the witness table) that summarized the Conflict of Interest (Robins, 2016) that SBOT exemplifies in its “unified bar concept,” i.e. SBOT is a professional body of lawyers, responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in their jurisdiction; AND ALSO comprise professional organizations dedicated to serving their members. SBOT, a “unified bar,” unites trade association endeavors with an attorney disciplinary authority. Although Texas still has a unified state bar association, it is worth noting that the U.S. Supreme Court has fairly recently ruled that professional guilds are not exempt from U.S. antitrust laws: North Carolina State Board of Dental Examiners v. Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Robins noted that SAC is aware of this new legal precedent and potential changes. (SAC Chair Larry Gonzales again looked thoroughly exhausted and perplexed but asked Rich Robins not a single question.)
On June 23rd, 2016, the State Bar of Texas (SBOT) and the Sunset Advisory Commission (SAC) met after 7pm to discuss SAC 2016 Report Recommendations. The author of SAC’s 2016 Recommendations Project Manager, Sean Shurleff, was NOT PRESENT. An uninformed and uninterested team leader (Katharine Teleki) mentioned that SAC Report Project Manager, Sean Shurleff, was “unable to attend!” Only a few SAC 2016 Members remained after 7pm; apparently exhausted and bleary eyed.
SBOT’s Executive Director, currently Michelle Hunter, represented SBOT’s Board of Directors made up of volunteers. The current president of the SBOT, Trey Apffel, appeared at the witness table; but sat quietly while Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel’s (CDC) Linda Acevedo absurdly lied to SAC 2016 Members that CDC did not ever receive any Complaints about the Grievance Process. Commission on Lawyer Discipline’s Chief John Neal did NOT explain why Guy Harrison, the prior CLD Chief for six years, who just recently stepped down, did NOT attend the SAC conference (because the state legislature must renew SBOT’s charter or else SBOT will essentially lose its authority to continue operating). NO ONE asked why the chosen SBOT Panel did not have representatives from The Board of Disciplinary Appeals (BODA) (e.g., Chair Marvin W. Jones or his understudy David N. Kitner) and the Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) (e.g., Catherine N. Wylie).
Oddly enough, the Texas Bar did not notify its dues-paying membership of the Sunset Review process. (Wikipedia, 2016) A few “Public” commenters were present to give three minutes of rebut (each) to about four SAC 2016 Members who had not already gone home due to the draining, all day meeting and the lateness of the SBOT session. None of the Commenters drew any questions from the “left-over” SAC 2016 Members.
1. In 2011, Texas Coalition on Lawyer Accountability’s (TCLA’s) major recommendation was for The Supreme Court of Texas to approve and commission an independent and long-overdue assessment of the Texas attorney grievance system.
On June 23rd, 2016, Julie Oliver, TCLA, presented a 3 minute refutation to SBOT’s Acevedo’s inane and certainly FALSE statement that there were “NO COMPLAINTS MADE TO CDC about the Grievance Process. It was so apparent that Chair Larry Gonzales did not COMPREHEND that – the overwhelming defeat of proposed amendments in the referendum vote in early 2011 – was NOT because SBOT’s Membership disagreed among themselves about amendment proposals which SBOT officials intended to promulgate; it was because the mammoth Membership disagreed with the egregious provisions of amendments, presented by SBOT’s professional body of lawyers and appointees of The Supreme Court of Texas responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in their jurisdiction. The Membership “as a whole” rose up against SBOT’s officials and appointees of The Supreme Court, instead – prodigiously siding with TCLA’s Julie Oliver’s and the Public’s Perspective – that SBOT’s proposed amendments “posed significant risk to the interests of clients and the public as a whole.” (Oliver, 2010)
Just a few moments before Julie Oliver’s 3 minute speech to the few remaining SAC 2016 Members (after 7PM), Chair Larry Gonzales demonstrated an alarming confusion in what might have been meant as “instructions” to SBOT officials at the witness table. In a faltering, but seemingly condescending monologue, Chair Gonzales indicated that provisions in the referendum vote in 2011 were OBJECTIONABLE to Members because SBOT had NOT “done its work and gotten the word out.” Per the Chair’s ill-informed, “off the cuff” observance, OBJECTIONS to FUTURE proposed amendments published for comment “might” be mitigated by “better communication” by SBOT’s officials and appointees of The Supreme Court to the nearly 100,000 Mandatory Members.” It is so ironic that the Chair of the SAC 2016 made such confounding comments just before Julie Oliver was seated alone at the witness table.
In fact, it had been SOLELY TCLA’s Executive Director Julie Oliver, rather than any SBOT official, appointee, or supporter, who was the MAJOR COMMUNICATOR to the mammoth Membership mass in 2010 & 2011; providing oral testimony at Public Hearings in 2011 held by SBOT on the proposed amendments that had NOT involved public advocates in the lengthy drafting process. The final draft by The Supreme Court provided for a referendum vote by SBOT’s membership, however, had failed to address provisions abhorrent to the Public (that Ms. Oliver had described in her testimony in Public Hearings). As a result, TCLA advocated for the ENTIRE MEMBERSHIP to vote against all parts of the referendum.
THE MEMBERSHIP OVERWHELMINGLY DEFEATED THE PROPOSED AMENDMENTS IN THE REFERENDUM VOTE IN EARLY 2011. Could Chair Larry Gonzales have missed the FACT that – he is on a FUTILE MISSION that the Mandatory SBOT Membership can be forced to vote for Amendment Provisions that are Client-adverse; and only benefit the interests of SBOT, the TRADE ASSOCIATION, i.e. SBOT has “served” its’ Membership by CONCEALING violations of Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct (TDRPC) and EXPUNGING records of valid Grievances against Respondents in an extremely self-serving effort to keep SBOT members’ premiums for professional liability insurance rates low.
Could Chair Larry Gonzales possibly perceive SAC 2016 might AGAIN propose that SBOT embark on a long process to FORCE any FUTURE referendum vote by “better communication of atrocious, PUBLIC-ADVERSE amendments?” When he cut Ms. Oliver off at the 3rd minute, Mr. Gonzales looked completely baffled. Shamefully, SAC Director Ken Levine must not have known enough about TCLA and the 2011 MISERABLY FAILED REFERENDUM, to correct Chair Gonzales embarrassingly simplistic assertions that yet another “referendum vote” might be wreaked upon the Mammoth Membership in 2017 and become mystically “accepted.” (Did Chair Gonzales also fail to observe that the huge 96,912 Membership had an 80% Voter abstention rate in a recent SBOT election of President and Directors?)
Neither the SAC 2016 Chair or Members nor SAC Director Ken Levine questioned why there was no Chair (Catherine N. Wylie) of the Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) panel at the witness table. Yet, GOC had been charged in 2011 with making recommendations to The Court to improve the Grievance system so that it PROTECTS THE PUBLIC.
In April, 2011, TCLA provided input on behalf of The Public into SBOT’s budget process, citing MAJOR CONCERNS:
▪ seriously declining numbers of disciplinary actions completed against Texas attorneys, despite significant increases in the number of attorneys
▪ programs: CAAP (Client Attorney Assistance Program) and the Ombudsman.
To date, NO ONE has stressed the importance of PROTECTING THE CONCERNS OF CLIENTS IN THE GRIEVANCE PROCESS; except for TCLA’s Julie Oliver (much respected by the Mammoth Membership) who unabashedly stands up to the INCOMPETENT & CORRUPT SBOT officials and appointees of The Supreme Court that are self-serving and lack all integrity.
It is a humiliation that NO ONE on the SAC 2016 Member Panel inquired about GOC’s RECOMMENDATIONS from the 2011 debacle. Demonstrating abject debauchery against The Public, SAC Director Ken Levine (evidenced by the RECOMMENDATIONS in SAC 2016 Report authored by the ABSENT Sean Shurleff) actually purports to EXPAND the egregious CAAP. In addition, - shamefully - it has not yet “come to light” that the Ombudsman program ended abruptly when OCDC’s Ombudsman Maureen Ray mysteriously gave up her Law License in April 2015. SBOT has NOT HIRED ANY LAWYER TO TAKE HER PLACE AT SBOT. (Most likely, NO LAWYER WILL TAKE AN SBOT POSITION IN WHICH THEIR DUTY IS TO EXPLAIN WHY 95% OF ALL GRIEVANCES ACKNOWLEDGED AS RECEIVED BY SBOT, ARE DENIED & DISMISSED; COMPLAINANTS ARE GIVEN NO AMENDMENT OR APPEAL RIGHTS! Therefore, since April, 2015, there is NO ONE at SBOT who has the DUTY to give EXPLANATIONS of the DENIALS, DISMISSALS and EXPUNGEMENTS of 95% of all Grievances acknowledged as received annually by SBOT. One must wonder: has GOC been DISCHARGED by SBOT as well?
In 2011, TCLA’s major recommendation was for The Supreme Court of Texas to approve and commission an independent and long-overdue assessment of the Texas attorney grievance system. NONE HAS EVER BEEN DONE! It is apparent that SAC Chair Gonzales and SAC Director Ken Levine portend to inflict the egregious Grievance system on The Public for another 12 years - based SOLELY on the unusable and misleading Sean Shurleff report and “off the cuff” observances of disinterested SAC Members and Legislators.
2. Sean Shurleff’s SAC 2016 Report is useless. SAC 2016 Members directed, instead, to the SAC 2003 Report Recommendations to find answers to why SBOT’s Grievance Process is DYSFUNCTIONAL.
Debbie G. Asbury, Statfoundation.com, (Asbury, 2011) presented a rebut that Sean Shurleff’s SAC 2016 Report Recommendations (which were haphazardly “passed along” by SAC Director Ken Levine) were so uninformative and distorted that SAC 2016 Members would do Texans a favor to just discard the current Report and refer to the SAC 2003 Report to find answers to why SBOT’s Grievance Process is DYSFUNCTIONAL. (SAC Chair Larry Gonzales cut me off after 3 minutes and did not ask questions to draw out the remainder of my 5 minute speech. A bewildered-looking Chair Gonzales did acknowledge the plethora of writings, Reports and full documentations that I had presented to SAC 2016.)
3. SBOT’s Exploitative Ruses, effectuated 1/1/2004; after Implementation of SAC 2003 Complainant-adverse Changes, has generated significant legal LIABILITY to SBOT Board Members – including, potentially, treble damages and criminal (Texas Legislators MUST IMMEDIATELY consider whether to provide for the defense and indemnification of boards and board members.)
Rich Robins, a Texas attorney, presented a refute (from the witness table) that summarized the Conflict of Interest (Robins, 2016) that SBOT exemplifies in its “unified bar concept,” i.e. SBOT is a professional body of lawyers, responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in their jurisdiction; AND ALSO comprise professional organizations dedicated to serving their members. SBOT, a “unified bar,” unites trade association endeavors with an attorney disciplinary authority. Although Texas still has a unified state bar association, it is worth noting that the U.S. Supreme Court has fairly recently ruled that professional guilds are not exempt from U.S. antitrust laws: North Carolina State Board of Dental Examiners v. Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Robins noted that SAC is aware of this new legal precedent and potential changes. (SAC Chair Larry Gonzales again looked thoroughly exhausted and perplexed but asked Rich Robins not a single question.)
|
Letter, Nov. 2nd, 2015, below is to Sunset Advisory Commission which is due to make a full report, early in 2016, on the multiple problems the State Bar of Texas has and the scandalous improprieties in the Grievance Denial Procedure. |
" I contend that Chief Disciplinary Counsel Linda A. Acevedo, and GOC Chair Catherine N. Wylie are ineffectual in their functions for the State Bar of Texas and for THE TEXAS SUPREME COURT. I can only foresee the huge public outcry in Texas when the Media begins to publicize the Findings of the Report that I am compiling for THE TEXAS SUPREME COURT, which details and documents my firm contention that the Texas Grievance System is an unlawful protocol of the CDC and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals (BODA) which denies Due Process of Law to thousands of Grievance Complainants and Respondents each year."
I have sent emails and letters to State Bar of Texas Spokeswoman Claire Anne Reynold Mock but have not received a single, solitary word back from her. Spokeswoman Mock has apparently declined any comment about the fact that (Grievance Oversight Committee) GOC Chair Catherine Wylie, S.M. Beckage, K.W. Morgan and Linda A. Acevedo are conducting a Grievance Rejection Procedure which conceals Grievances and actually sends the Grievances back to the Complainant, unread, unrecorded and unclassified! By sending out “a standard form” Grievance Rejection letter, CDC - with GOV Chair Wylie’s full knowledge and consent - that contains NO ATTORNEY’s NAME on it, no record is ever kept of a Complainant’s Grievance.
MS. CLAIRE ANNE REYNOLDS MOCK
Eligible to Practice in Texas
State Bar of Texas
Bar Card Number: 24067772
TX License Date: 05/01/2009
Primary Practice Location: Austin , Texas
1414 Colorado St.
Austin, TX 78701
Practice Areas: None Reported By Attorney
Eligible to Practice in Texas
State Bar of Texas
Bar Card Number: 24067772
TX License Date: 05/01/2009
Primary Practice Location: Austin , Texas
1414 Colorado St.
Austin, TX 78701
Practice Areas: None Reported By Attorney
Third Lawyer Objects to Grievance Dismissals
Angela Morris, Texas Lawyer
Read more: http://www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202731504850/Third-Lawyer-Objects-to-Grievance-Dismissals#ixzz3m5jtjqvX
For at least the third time in about a year, a Texas attorney is voicing concerns about the way that attorney disciplinary grievances get dismissed.
Arlington lawyer Mayur Amin is on a letter-writing campaign because he claims that he filed a grievance against another lawyer, but the State Bar of Texas Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel dismissed it with little explanation, and the Texas Board of Disciplinary Appeals affirmed the dismissal without explanation.
The chief disciplinary counsel represents the Commission for Lawyer Discipline (CFLD) in prosecuting attorney disciplinary matters. BODA hears appeals from the disciplinary system.
Amin emailed his letters to Texas Lawyer. In response to questions, he wrote in an email that he wanted "to educate and bring awareness to real issues and impediments facing Texas citizens when it comes to access for justice."
Most recently, he wrote to Claire Mock, spokeswoman for the chief disciplinary counsel's office. Attached to the July 6 letter are two July 6 emails from Mock. She wrote to Amin that she would review the grievance and provide more information about why it was dismissed. About an hour later, she wrote that Amin's grievance was a cover letter and 2,785 pages of attachments, and it was unreasonable to review it because the office receives over 7,000 grievances per year. She wrote that he could amend his grievance and refile it, "attaching only those documents that will support your assertions."
She added, "I know this process can be frustrating sometimes, but I'm happy to help you to the best of my abilities."
In response to a call for comment, Mock said she could not acknowledge the existence of a grievance, because "there's no public information I can give."
Amin had alleged that his opposing counsel in an appeal committed misconduct.
His grievance attachments were appellate briefs and the supporting record, he wrote in an email to Texas Lawyer.
In his letter to Mock, Amin wrote, "Judicial and attorney misconduct runs rampant in our legal system these days. BODA and the OCDC play an important role in keeping such conduct in check. But they cannot do so with the current apparent attitude of 'lets see how many of these grievances we can get off of our desks as quickly as possible.'"
He wrote that the commission, BODA and the chief disciplinary counsel's office should work on a plan "to actually address the substantive merits of the grievances received."
Previously, Amin wrote letters to Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht and CFLD chairman Guy Harrison.
He copied his letters to the chairwoman and vice chairman of the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission. The commission reviews state agencies periodically and recommends changes for legislators. The state bar undergoes legislative review in 2017.
Amin wrote that it's hard for him to recommend changes in the disciplinary system without having access to management information to evaluate the efficiency of the organizations. The Sunset Commission is assigned that job, he wrote. But the commission may have problems accessing complaint records because of confidentiality provisions, he added.
Past Complaints
In May 2014, a John Doe defendant—who saw his grievance against a lawyer dismissed--sued entities in the attorney disciplinary system for a copy of the recommendation to dismiss his grievance. But the defendants claimed that the law and procedural rules prevented them from releasing it. A judge dismissed the case in October 2014.
Also in the fall of 2014, Dallas lawyer Marc Stanley filed a "petition for administrative relief" with the Texas Supreme Court to ask the justices to appoint a task force to investigate and remedy problems with classifying grievances. He claimed that the chief disciplinary counsel regularly classified legitimate grievances as "inquiries" and dismissed them based on explanations outside the law. Stanley claimed that BODA "rubber stamps" those decisions.
Hecht said on July 6 that he had not received Amin's letters yet. He added that the Commission for Lawyer Discipline and the high court's Grievance Oversight Committee are reviewing Stanley's petition.
That committee, which studies the lawyer discipline system and recommends improvements, issues its next biennial report in 2016.
Hecht declined to comment on the issue of grievance dismissals.
"We want to hear from the commission, and we want to hear from the grievance oversight committee: What they think the best practice should be," said Hecht.
Read more: http://www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202731504850/Third-Lawyer-Objects-to-Grievance-Dismissals#ixzz3m5kyVIE5
Angela Morris, Texas Lawyer
Read more: http://www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202731504850/Third-Lawyer-Objects-to-Grievance-Dismissals#ixzz3m5jtjqvX
For at least the third time in about a year, a Texas attorney is voicing concerns about the way that attorney disciplinary grievances get dismissed.
Arlington lawyer Mayur Amin is on a letter-writing campaign because he claims that he filed a grievance against another lawyer, but the State Bar of Texas Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel dismissed it with little explanation, and the Texas Board of Disciplinary Appeals affirmed the dismissal without explanation.
The chief disciplinary counsel represents the Commission for Lawyer Discipline (CFLD) in prosecuting attorney disciplinary matters. BODA hears appeals from the disciplinary system.
Amin emailed his letters to Texas Lawyer. In response to questions, he wrote in an email that he wanted "to educate and bring awareness to real issues and impediments facing Texas citizens when it comes to access for justice."
Most recently, he wrote to Claire Mock, spokeswoman for the chief disciplinary counsel's office. Attached to the July 6 letter are two July 6 emails from Mock. She wrote to Amin that she would review the grievance and provide more information about why it was dismissed. About an hour later, she wrote that Amin's grievance was a cover letter and 2,785 pages of attachments, and it was unreasonable to review it because the office receives over 7,000 grievances per year. She wrote that he could amend his grievance and refile it, "attaching only those documents that will support your assertions."
She added, "I know this process can be frustrating sometimes, but I'm happy to help you to the best of my abilities."
In response to a call for comment, Mock said she could not acknowledge the existence of a grievance, because "there's no public information I can give."
Amin had alleged that his opposing counsel in an appeal committed misconduct.
His grievance attachments were appellate briefs and the supporting record, he wrote in an email to Texas Lawyer.
In his letter to Mock, Amin wrote, "Judicial and attorney misconduct runs rampant in our legal system these days. BODA and the OCDC play an important role in keeping such conduct in check. But they cannot do so with the current apparent attitude of 'lets see how many of these grievances we can get off of our desks as quickly as possible.'"
He wrote that the commission, BODA and the chief disciplinary counsel's office should work on a plan "to actually address the substantive merits of the grievances received."
Previously, Amin wrote letters to Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht and CFLD chairman Guy Harrison.
He copied his letters to the chairwoman and vice chairman of the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission. The commission reviews state agencies periodically and recommends changes for legislators. The state bar undergoes legislative review in 2017.
Amin wrote that it's hard for him to recommend changes in the disciplinary system without having access to management information to evaluate the efficiency of the organizations. The Sunset Commission is assigned that job, he wrote. But the commission may have problems accessing complaint records because of confidentiality provisions, he added.
Past Complaints
In May 2014, a John Doe defendant—who saw his grievance against a lawyer dismissed--sued entities in the attorney disciplinary system for a copy of the recommendation to dismiss his grievance. But the defendants claimed that the law and procedural rules prevented them from releasing it. A judge dismissed the case in October 2014.
Also in the fall of 2014, Dallas lawyer Marc Stanley filed a "petition for administrative relief" with the Texas Supreme Court to ask the justices to appoint a task force to investigate and remedy problems with classifying grievances. He claimed that the chief disciplinary counsel regularly classified legitimate grievances as "inquiries" and dismissed them based on explanations outside the law. Stanley claimed that BODA "rubber stamps" those decisions.
Hecht said on July 6 that he had not received Amin's letters yet. He added that the Commission for Lawyer Discipline and the high court's Grievance Oversight Committee are reviewing Stanley's petition.
That committee, which studies the lawyer discipline system and recommends improvements, issues its next biennial report in 2016.
Hecht declined to comment on the issue of grievance dismissals.
"We want to hear from the commission, and we want to hear from the grievance oversight committee: What they think the best practice should be," said Hecht.
Read more: http://www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202731504850/Third-Lawyer-Objects-to-Grievance-Dismissals#ixzz3m5kyVIE5
K.W. Morgan, Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel refused to review a Grievance filed by Ty Clevenger. (http://lawflog.com/?p=553)
All lawyers are treated equally, but some lawyers are more equal than others
July 9, 2015 by Ty Clevenger
The Tenth Court of Appeals in Waco will now decide whether College Station attorney Gaines West gets booted from a Brazos County lawsuit, and that decision could create a conundrum for the State Bar of Texas. An average lawyer could get in serious trouble for doing what Mr. West is accused of doing, but Mr. West is no average lawyer: he previously served as chairman of both the Texas Supreme Court’s Grievance Oversight Committee and its Board of Disciplinary Appeals.
Yesterday evening, the Court of Appeals asked Mr. West to respond to a petition for mandamus seeking his disqualification from Clayton Williams Energy, Inc. v. Williamson (full disclosure: I’m one of the attorneys representing Mr. West’s former clients). As explained in the petition, Mr. West switched sides in the trial court, representing a new party against former clients whom he had already represented in that same case. That’s a big no-no according to the professional rules governing lawyers, never mind the rules of common sense, and it is particularly ironic since Mr. West advertises himself as an expert on attorney disciplinary matters.
On December 30, 2014, another attorney sent a letter to Mr. West demanding that he stop representing the new party against his former clients. In a January 6, 2015 response, Mr. West refused to withdraw from the case. That was not particularly surprising, as Mr. West is not known for his humility. But I suspect there is another underlying reason for his stubbornness: he knows that where the state bar is concerned, lawyers with political connections (i.e., like him) typically do not have to play by the same rules as other lawyers. In other words, Mr. West may have thought that he would be immune from professional misconduct charges because of his political connections.
That would not be an unreasonable assumption on his part. As I explained in the latter half of my March 9, 2015 post, the state bar has long employed a double standard for lawyers with political connections. The most recent example is Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who admitted in writing that he violated state securities law (potentially a third-degree felony), yet the state bar refused even to investigate. It now seems likely that Mr. Paxton will be indicted for criminal charges that the state bar deemed unworthy of an investigation.
Just yesterday, Texas Lawyer ran another article about an attorney speaking out against the state bar’s practice of arbitrarily dismissing legitimate complaints. Arlington lawyer Mayur Amin described the state bar’s attitude as “lets see how many of these grievances we can get off of our desks as quickly as possible,” and he is absolutely right. On December 17, 2014, for example, I filed an online grievance against Bryan F. “Rusty” Russ, Jr. (who spent 16 years as a member of a grievance committee) because he filed claims in court without the permission of his client and against the wishes of his client. In Texas, that’s not just professional misconduct, it’s a third-degree felony.
Assistant Disciplinary Counsel K.W. Morgan sent me a form letter the same day stating that my grievance was rejected because it was related to a prior grievance that had already been dismissed. Obviously, K.W. Morgan had not read the grievance, because it had nothing to do with a prior grievance. I pointed this out to a more senior attorney at the state bar, and he admitted in writing that K.W. Morgan had wrongly classified my grievance because, in fact, it had nothing to do with a prior grievance. Yet the state bar would not reinstate the grievance, and I had no right of appeal because of the way the grievance was classified, even though the state bar admitted that it should not have been classified that way. Meanwhile, a corrupt (but politically-connected) lawyer may have perpetrated a crime against his own client, but the state bar was fully content to keep its head in the sand.
I could list other examples, but I think you get the picture. State bar officers periodically hold strategy sessions to improve the image of the legal profession, and on at least one occasion the Texas bar directors authorized a six-figure public relations campaign, but they never seem to understand the real problem. To wit, the legal profession has a terrible reputation for one reason, and one reason only: we’ve earned it. If the bar directors really wanted to improve the legal profession’s whorehouse reputation, they could start by purging the whores from the whorehouse.
I had some hope that the Texas Legislature would take up state bar reform in its last session, but as explained below, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick sank that ship. As a practical matter, nothing will change until the public demands an overhaul of our attorney disciplinary system, and that means the press needs to pick up the story. The state bar started charging prosecutors with misconduct, for example, after the press reported that innocent people had been sent to prison and, in one case, death row (see Ken Anderson, Charles Sebest, and John Healey). Angela Morris at Texas Lawyer has done a thorough job of covering the failures of the Texas disciplinary system, but she has a very significant limitation: Texas Lawyer is read primarily by Texas lawyers.
Will the state bar file a disciplinary case against Gaines West?
If the Court of Appeals decides that Mr. West violated the rule against conflicts of interest, the bar will have a much harder time burying a grievance against him (although that’s not to say that it couldn’t get buried). Likewise, my clients could sue Mr. West for breach of fiduciary duty, in which case the bar would have a hard time ignoring a jury verdict. If a disciplinary case was filed, Mr. West would have the option of choosing a public jury trial or a private hearing in front of a grievance committee. Most attorneys choose the latter, and not without reason. The grievance committees are appointed primarily by the locally-elected member of the state bar’s board of directors, which means they are very much subject to political influence.
As I noted on BoogerCountyMafia.com, ethically challenged lawyers like Mr. Russ and Mr. West tend to seek election or appointment of themselves or their colleagues to the grievance committees or the board of directors. It seems to be an easy way to keep standards low and protect oneself from the consequences of professional misconduct.
And wouldn’t you know that Mr. West’s law partner, Roy Brantley, was the state bar director for the Bryan-College Station area until recently, thus he probably selected some of the members of the local grievance committee. At first glance, it would appear that Mr. West has an ace in the hole.
If, however, the Court of Appeals disqualifies Mr. West on the grounds that he violated the rule against conflicts of interest, Mr. West arguably loses his ace in the hole. Although no Texas court has formally decided the issue, a judicial finding that Mr. West violated the rule would probably be binding on the grievance committee, in which case the committee would have no choice but to find him “guilty.” The committee could ostensibly give Mr. West a private reprimand, but that would be hard to justify if the Court of Appeals has already declared — publicly — that he violated the rules of professional conduct.
Lt. Governor Dan Patrick derails state bar reform
As I reported on March 9, 2015, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick decided to abolish the Jurisprudence Committee of the Texas Senate. That means the Texas Senate is probably the only state or federal legislative chamber in the United States without a jurisprudence / judiciary committee. I guess he decided that our judges and lawyers are so well behaved that they don’t need any oversight.
I was particularly bummed about this because the committee was poised to take up legislation reforming both the State Commission on Judicial Conduct and the state bar. On January 7, 2015, I had written a letter to several officials, including Senate Jurisprudence Committee Chairman Royce West, about how the State Commission on Judicial Conduct had bungled the case against Judge Robert M. Stem of the 82nd District Court of Falls and Robertson Counties. A few days later, I received a call from the committee staff asking me to help draft legislation to reform both the commission and the state bar. Then the committee was abolished. So much for that.
tyclevenger@gmail.com
July 9, 2015 by Ty Clevenger
The Tenth Court of Appeals in Waco will now decide whether College Station attorney Gaines West gets booted from a Brazos County lawsuit, and that decision could create a conundrum for the State Bar of Texas. An average lawyer could get in serious trouble for doing what Mr. West is accused of doing, but Mr. West is no average lawyer: he previously served as chairman of both the Texas Supreme Court’s Grievance Oversight Committee and its Board of Disciplinary Appeals.
Yesterday evening, the Court of Appeals asked Mr. West to respond to a petition for mandamus seeking his disqualification from Clayton Williams Energy, Inc. v. Williamson (full disclosure: I’m one of the attorneys representing Mr. West’s former clients). As explained in the petition, Mr. West switched sides in the trial court, representing a new party against former clients whom he had already represented in that same case. That’s a big no-no according to the professional rules governing lawyers, never mind the rules of common sense, and it is particularly ironic since Mr. West advertises himself as an expert on attorney disciplinary matters.
On December 30, 2014, another attorney sent a letter to Mr. West demanding that he stop representing the new party against his former clients. In a January 6, 2015 response, Mr. West refused to withdraw from the case. That was not particularly surprising, as Mr. West is not known for his humility. But I suspect there is another underlying reason for his stubbornness: he knows that where the state bar is concerned, lawyers with political connections (i.e., like him) typically do not have to play by the same rules as other lawyers. In other words, Mr. West may have thought that he would be immune from professional misconduct charges because of his political connections.
That would not be an unreasonable assumption on his part. As I explained in the latter half of my March 9, 2015 post, the state bar has long employed a double standard for lawyers with political connections. The most recent example is Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who admitted in writing that he violated state securities law (potentially a third-degree felony), yet the state bar refused even to investigate. It now seems likely that Mr. Paxton will be indicted for criminal charges that the state bar deemed unworthy of an investigation.
Just yesterday, Texas Lawyer ran another article about an attorney speaking out against the state bar’s practice of arbitrarily dismissing legitimate complaints. Arlington lawyer Mayur Amin described the state bar’s attitude as “lets see how many of these grievances we can get off of our desks as quickly as possible,” and he is absolutely right. On December 17, 2014, for example, I filed an online grievance against Bryan F. “Rusty” Russ, Jr. (who spent 16 years as a member of a grievance committee) because he filed claims in court without the permission of his client and against the wishes of his client. In Texas, that’s not just professional misconduct, it’s a third-degree felony.
Assistant Disciplinary Counsel K.W. Morgan sent me a form letter the same day stating that my grievance was rejected because it was related to a prior grievance that had already been dismissed. Obviously, K.W. Morgan had not read the grievance, because it had nothing to do with a prior grievance. I pointed this out to a more senior attorney at the state bar, and he admitted in writing that K.W. Morgan had wrongly classified my grievance because, in fact, it had nothing to do with a prior grievance. Yet the state bar would not reinstate the grievance, and I had no right of appeal because of the way the grievance was classified, even though the state bar admitted that it should not have been classified that way. Meanwhile, a corrupt (but politically-connected) lawyer may have perpetrated a crime against his own client, but the state bar was fully content to keep its head in the sand.
I could list other examples, but I think you get the picture. State bar officers periodically hold strategy sessions to improve the image of the legal profession, and on at least one occasion the Texas bar directors authorized a six-figure public relations campaign, but they never seem to understand the real problem. To wit, the legal profession has a terrible reputation for one reason, and one reason only: we’ve earned it. If the bar directors really wanted to improve the legal profession’s whorehouse reputation, they could start by purging the whores from the whorehouse.
I had some hope that the Texas Legislature would take up state bar reform in its last session, but as explained below, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick sank that ship. As a practical matter, nothing will change until the public demands an overhaul of our attorney disciplinary system, and that means the press needs to pick up the story. The state bar started charging prosecutors with misconduct, for example, after the press reported that innocent people had been sent to prison and, in one case, death row (see Ken Anderson, Charles Sebest, and John Healey). Angela Morris at Texas Lawyer has done a thorough job of covering the failures of the Texas disciplinary system, but she has a very significant limitation: Texas Lawyer is read primarily by Texas lawyers.
Will the state bar file a disciplinary case against Gaines West?
If the Court of Appeals decides that Mr. West violated the rule against conflicts of interest, the bar will have a much harder time burying a grievance against him (although that’s not to say that it couldn’t get buried). Likewise, my clients could sue Mr. West for breach of fiduciary duty, in which case the bar would have a hard time ignoring a jury verdict. If a disciplinary case was filed, Mr. West would have the option of choosing a public jury trial or a private hearing in front of a grievance committee. Most attorneys choose the latter, and not without reason. The grievance committees are appointed primarily by the locally-elected member of the state bar’s board of directors, which means they are very much subject to political influence.
As I noted on BoogerCountyMafia.com, ethically challenged lawyers like Mr. Russ and Mr. West tend to seek election or appointment of themselves or their colleagues to the grievance committees or the board of directors. It seems to be an easy way to keep standards low and protect oneself from the consequences of professional misconduct.
And wouldn’t you know that Mr. West’s law partner, Roy Brantley, was the state bar director for the Bryan-College Station area until recently, thus he probably selected some of the members of the local grievance committee. At first glance, it would appear that Mr. West has an ace in the hole.
If, however, the Court of Appeals disqualifies Mr. West on the grounds that he violated the rule against conflicts of interest, Mr. West arguably loses his ace in the hole. Although no Texas court has formally decided the issue, a judicial finding that Mr. West violated the rule would probably be binding on the grievance committee, in which case the committee would have no choice but to find him “guilty.” The committee could ostensibly give Mr. West a private reprimand, but that would be hard to justify if the Court of Appeals has already declared — publicly — that he violated the rules of professional conduct.
Lt. Governor Dan Patrick derails state bar reform
As I reported on March 9, 2015, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick decided to abolish the Jurisprudence Committee of the Texas Senate. That means the Texas Senate is probably the only state or federal legislative chamber in the United States without a jurisprudence / judiciary committee. I guess he decided that our judges and lawyers are so well behaved that they don’t need any oversight.
I was particularly bummed about this because the committee was poised to take up legislation reforming both the State Commission on Judicial Conduct and the state bar. On January 7, 2015, I had written a letter to several officials, including Senate Jurisprudence Committee Chairman Royce West, about how the State Commission on Judicial Conduct had bungled the case against Judge Robert M. Stem of the 82nd District Court of Falls and Robertson Counties. A few days later, I received a call from the committee staff asking me to help draft legislation to reform both the commission and the state bar. Then the committee was abolished. So much for that.
tyclevenger@gmail.com
The State Bar is disgracefully trying to protect both Barron Casteel and Carter Casteel from much required Disciplinary Action.
Barron Casteel's and Carter Casteel's "services" were terminated but, to date, we have only received one letter from Barron Casteel in which he steadfastly refused to even discuss his termination with his Client, Clement W. Machacek.
March 5th, 2015
RE: The Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) Eschews Non-Attorney Input in Its Review of the Operation of the Attorney-Client Grievance Process, Prohibiting my Valid Feedback from Reaching The Supreme Court of Texas
Dear Mr. Marc R. Stanley:
Grievance Complainants are insulted by improper, incomprehensible and unexplained classifications by CDC and BODA of our Grievances as “inquiries” – which require no further investigation by The Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel, CDC. Instead of providing input of the improprieties of Grievances classifications by CDC and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals (BODA), GOC stands as a chief impediment to The Supreme Court of Texas’ recognition of the prevalence of The State Bar of Texas Grievance Process’ failure to adhere to TX Supreme Court’s mandates, i.e., TEX GV. CODE ANN. Section 81.072 and Section 81.073. Grievance Complainants are thwarted by The State Bar of Texas Grievance System, “as is,” due to its failures to provide:
Debbie G. Asbury
RE: The Grievance Oversight Committee (GOC) Eschews Non-Attorney Input in Its Review of the Operation of the Attorney-Client Grievance Process, Prohibiting my Valid Feedback from Reaching The Supreme Court of Texas
Dear Mr. Marc R. Stanley:
Grievance Complainants are insulted by improper, incomprehensible and unexplained classifications by CDC and BODA of our Grievances as “inquiries” – which require no further investigation by The Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel, CDC. Instead of providing input of the improprieties of Grievances classifications by CDC and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals (BODA), GOC stands as a chief impediment to The Supreme Court of Texas’ recognition of the prevalence of The State Bar of Texas Grievance Process’ failure to adhere to TX Supreme Court’s mandates, i.e., TEX GV. CODE ANN. Section 81.072 and Section 81.073. Grievance Complainants are thwarted by The State Bar of Texas Grievance System, “as is,” due to its failures to provide:
- CDC investigations of offenses against us by Texas attorneys when transgressions certainly do constitute Professional Misconduct cognizable under the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct 2.10,
- Full explanations of why our valid Grievances, documenting Professional Misconduct, as it is defined in the TDRPC, are dismissed as unimportant “inquiries” – which require no further investigation by CDC.
- in the STATEMENT OF THIS CASE: The current dysfunctional state of the Texas attorney disciplinary system and its clear violations of this Court’s procedural rules governing the attorney disciplinary system in Texas undermine the authority of this Court, the administration of justice, and the respect of the public for the legal profession in Texas.
- In the PRAYER: Therefore, Petitioner respectfully requests that the Court grant this Petition, establish an administrative docket for this matter, and administratively enforce compliance with its Rules by ordering the State Bar of Texas, the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel, and the Board of Disciplinary Appeals to scrupulously apply the Court’s Texas Rules of Disciplinary Procedure, as written, and without adding arbitrary, extra-legal exceptions that are inconsistent with the Court’s Rules.
Debbie G. Asbury
