What Do You Have To Do To Get Disbarred in this State!
Charles Rogers hired attorney Lawrence J. Fleming to file suit against Bank of America. A couple of years later, Fleming told Rogers that the case was set for trial and advised him to appear at the courthouse. When Rogers arrived, Fleming told him the case had been settled for $75k. When Fleming didn't cough up the $75k, Rogers hired another lawyer to look into the matter and found that no suit had ever been filed.
Rogers filed an ethics complaint with the Missouri Bar. Fleming then convinced Rogers to withdraw the ethics complaint, with a promise to personally pay Rogers the $75k. Rogers withdrew the complaint, but of course Fleming never paid.
A prisoner, Robert Goerger, retained Fleming to file a post-conviction motion to get him out of jail on the basis of ineffective counsel by his previous attorney. Fleming, although paid, never filed a motion, and a subsequent motion was time barred.
The Bar Committee, hearing both the matters, recommended that Fleming be suspended indefinitely, with leave to apply for re-admission in six months. The Missouri Supreme Court, which has final say on these matters, simply admonished him and suspended him, but incredibly suspended the suspension. In short, it did nothing.
Having escaped with his license, Fleming carried on his malpractice with a prisoner named Guerra, who began corresponding with Fleming regarding several claims. Fleming informed Guerra that he would like to represent Guerra, but could not do so without a retainer.
Guerra, in turn, informed Fleming that he was expecting a sizeable inheritance from the estate of his father in California, and that he would like Fleming to represent him as soon as payment was available.
Fleming continued to correspond with Guerra during the following year. Later, Fleming was paid a $1,500.00 retainer to begin formal representation of Guerra. Guerra then directed the attorney for his father's estate to send his inheritance check directly to Fleming. Fleming received a check for $215,158.69 from the estate, and deposited it into his (Fleming's) personal trust account.
Immediately thereafter, Guerra signed an engagement contract with Fleming, in which Fleming agreed to represent Guerra in four different matters.
Ten days later, Fleming withdrew $10,000.00 from the trust account. Thirty-five days after the first withdrawal, Fleming withdrew $7,500.00. Nineteen days later, Fleming withdrew $7,500.00. Over the course of a five-month period, Fleming withdrew $45,650.00 from the trust account.
The Bar Committee charged Fleming with assuring Guerra that he had entered an appearance in cases where Fleming had in fact not entered an appearance; represented to the Court in one case that he had his client's permission to dismiss an appeal when he did not, and essentially lied to the Bar panel about his actions. It's not clear that he was charged with misappropriation of funds.
Fleming was finally disbarred. If he had been thrown out the first time, the second matter (along with two others that were in the second complaint for other clients) would not have happened.
The record in one of the cases suggests that Fleming asked for a stay in the ethics matters pending a criminal matter against him, but a check of the records fails to show that Fleming was ever charged with anything.
What's my gripe? We lawyers are mandated to attend ethics education each year when 99% of us know what to do and not to do. But when an attorney like Fleming does something so beyond the pale, it takes forever to get him out.