Two lawyer discipline cases contrasted

VSB to lawyer: Fire your assistant/husband

By Peter Vieth
Published: January 6, 2012
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

The Virginia State Bar has ordered a Richmond lawyer to get rid of her assistant – her husband, an ex-lawyer who was convicted of fraud and disbarred 20 years ago. Yvonne Cochran-Morton was given a public reprimand by a VSB disciplinary subcommittee for sloppy supervision of an employee and ordered to disassociate her law practice [...]

Glenn Lewis suspended by VSB

By Peter Vieth
Published: December 30, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

Glenn C. Lewis, a leading Northern Virginia divorce lawyer and former president of the Virginia Bar Association, has had his law license yanked by the Virginia State Bar for ignoring its demand for information amid financial troubles and allegations of misuse of client money. The Virginia State Bar administratively suspended Lewis’s license on Dec. 27 [...]

Reston lawyer reprimanded for court appearance after drinking

By Peter Vieth
Published: November 16, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

A Reston lawyer has received a public reprimand with terms from the Virginia State Bar based in part on allegations he repeatedly appeared in court after drinking. In one incident in 2009, Wayne R. Hartke was ordered to jail for 10 days by a Fairfax County general district judge. He told the judge he had [...]

Blogging lawyer disciplined, ordered to post disclaimers

By Peter Vieth
Published: October 20, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

A Virginia State Bar discipline committee rejected First Amendment defenses to find misconduct by a lawyer who wrote about his cases on the Internet without client consent and without a disclaimer saying case results may vary. The eight-member VSB district committee ordered Horace F. Hunter of Richmond to yank from his firm’s website any case [...]

Verdict slashed, lawyer referred for discipline

By Peter Vieth
Published: September 12, 2011
Tags: Charlottesville Circuit Court, Judge Edward Hogshire, Law Firms, Lawyer Discipline, Million-Dollar Verdicts, Sanctions, Wrongful Death

A Charlottesville judge slashed a record wrongful death verdict by two-thirds and ordered sanctions against the plaintiff and his lawyer in the aftermath of a hotly contested trial. Circuit Court Judge Edward L. Hogshire also referred Charlottesville lawyer Matthew B. Murray to the Virginia State Bar on three separate findings of wrongdoing, and referred Murray’s [...]

Henrico lawyer surrenders license

By Alan Cooper
Published: June 28, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

Henrico County lawyer William O. Smith has surrendered his license to practice law rather than contest allegations that he misappropriated hundreds of thousands of dollars from escrow accounts related to a title insurance agency. Smith is the owner-operator of the agency, Montbrook Title LLC. The agency’s primary client was LandSafe Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary [...]

Norfolk lawyer’s license suspended for five years

By Alan Cooper
Published: June 8, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

A Norfolk attorney has accepted a five-year suspension of her law license rather than contest ethical charges arising from an investment she asked a client to make. According to Virginia State Bar documents, the client asked Tina Elizabeth Orr to form two limited liability companies related to entertainment contracts in September 2006 and paid a [...]

VSB Disciplinary Board lets lawyer keep his license

By Alan Cooper
Published: June 3, 2011
Tags: Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

A Richmond lawyer has beaten the Virginia State Bar in its efforts to revoke his law license. At the end of an 11-hour hearing on May 20, the Virginia State Bar Disciplinary Board dismissed misconduct allegations against Charles E. Ayers Jr. “for lack of clear and convincing evidence.” The case to disbar Ayers was based [...]

Midlothian’s Garrett gets one-year suspension

By Peter Vieth
Published: June 1, 2011
Tags: Chesterfield County Circuit Court, Judge Jane Marum Roush, Lawyer Discipline, Virginia State Bar

Midlothian attorney Stacy F. Garrett III, a former Richmond prosecutor, has been hit with a second one-year suspension of his law license. A three-judge panel of Chesterfield County Circuit Court ordered the suspension for Garrett, finding he failed to use reasonable diligence in representing clients in two matters and he failed to respond to requests [...]