In re Keenan

• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts
• Citation: 313 Mass. 186,47 N.E.2d 12
• Parties: MATTER OF WILFRED B. KEENAN.
• Decision Date: 13 February 1943

313 Mass. 186

47 N.E.2d 12

MATTER OF WILFRED B. KEENAN.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.

February 13, 1943

October 9, 1942.

Present: FIELD, C.J., LUMMUS, QUA, DOLAN, & COX, JJ

Supreme Judicial Court, Jurisdiction, Membership in the bar, Superintendence of inferior courts, Records. Practice, Civil, Membership in the bar, Review by the Supreme Judicial Court, Information, Parties, Entry of judgment, Order for filing of papers. Jurisdiction, Membership in the bar. Attorney at Law. Res Judicata. Law of the Case. Evidence, Judicial notice, Presumptions and burden of proof, Of unfitness for membership in bar.

In determining questions of law raised upon an information, filed in this court by leave, respecting allowance by the Superior Court of a petition for admission to the bar of one who had been disbarred, this court considered, apart from statements in the information, matters which appeared of record in this court in previous proceedings respecting such person's disbarment.

An order by this court, directing that informations by the Attorney General and by certain bar associations relating to a proceeding in the Superior

Court, resulting in the granting of a petition for admission to the bar of one who had been disbarred, be received and entered upon this court's docket and making provision for notice to the respondent and subsequent pleadings, was in the nature of an administrative order only and was not a ruling precluding the respondent from contending that this court had no jurisdiction in the premises.

Favorable action by the Superior Court upon a petition for admission to the bar presented by one who had been disbarred was subject to review by this court in appropriate proceedings.

Subject to the limitation that the essential elements of notice and opportunity to be heard must be preserved, the judicial department, in view of its exclusive control of membership in the bar, has power to adopt any procedure in a proceeding for reviewing the granting of a petition for admission to the bar, as well as in a proceeding for admission to the bar or for disbarment, that it deems appropriate for such a proceeding; procedure applicable to actions at law, whether established by statute or by judicial decision, is to be followed only so far as the judicial department deems it to be appropriate.

The determination by the judicial department of what procedure is appropriate to be followed in review in proceedings for disbarment or for admission to the bar must be by the Supreme Judicial Court.

The mere fact, that a judgment favorable to the petitioner had been entered in the Superior Court upon a petition for admission to the bar presented by one who had been disbarred, did not preclude this court from reviewing such action in appropriate proceedings. [313 Mass. 187]

An information, presented to this court by a bar association or by the

Attorney General, which substantially describes action by the Superior Court admitting to the bar one who had been disbarred and which submits

"the entire matter" to this court "for such action as this court shall deem expedient in the interests of public welfare," is an appropriate proceeding for review of the matter by this court; no statutory method of review now provided would be appropriate or adequate.

Such an information was an appropriate procedure for review notwithstanding that the informant had not participated at all in the proceeding in the

Superior Court, or that, having participated therein, the informant had failed to bring to this court exceptions saved in the Superior Court, or that the allegations in the information did not entitle the informant

"to any judgment of or to any relief from" this court.

A judgment of disbarment of an attorney at law is also an adjudication of the facts upon which the judgment was based and conclusive evidence of his unfitness to be a member of the bar at the time of the disbarment, and, if he later petitions for admission to the bar, such adjudication remains evidence of such unfitness which he has the heavy burden of overcoming. A decision by this court, upon a report of the question by the Superior

Court, that the Superior Court had jurisdiction of a petition for admission to the bar by one who had been disbarred because he had corruptly influenced jurymen, did not preclude this court from determining, in a review in appropriate proceedings, whether a judgment of the Superior Court granting such petition should be set aside because the offence for which the petitioner had been disbarred was of such a kind as to preclude his readmission as a matter of law.

Upon an information to this court, for such action as it should deem expedient in the interests of the public welfare, relating to a proceeding in the Superior Court resulting in a judgment admitting to practice as an attorney at law a person who previously had been disbarred on the ground that he "corruptly influenced . . . jurymen . . . and was thereby guilty of gross misconduct," there were presented, as substantial questions worthy of judicial inquiry in this court's discretion, at least the questions whether the offence leading to the disbarment was of such a kind that, in the present state of the decisions, it forever precluded subsequent admission to the bar, and, if the offence were not of that kind, whether evidence, presented to the

Superior Court and leading to the judgment for admission to the bar, was of sufficient weight to overcome the evidence of lack of moral character supplied by the adjudication of disbarment.

Upon presentation for review by this court of all-inclusive records of a proceeding in the Superior Court concluding with a judgment admitting to the bar one who previously had been disbarred, this court is not precluded from considering the weight of evidence.

Upon presentation to this court of an information which it deemed appropriate proceedings for review by it of action in the Superior Court admitting to the bar one who had been disbarred because he had [313 Mass. 188]

"corruptly influenced . . . jurymen . . . and was thereby guilty of gross misconduct," an order was made that the Chief Justice of the

Superior Court send to this court the record of the proceedings in that court, such record to include or to be accompanied by, as an extension thereof, copies of all papers filed in the case and a transcript of the evidence in the case if such evidence had been taken by an official stenographer.

THREE INFORMATIONS, offered for filing with this court and on June 24, 1942, received for filing pursuant to the order described in the opinion.

R. T. Bushnell, Attorney General, (A.

J. Santry & W.

B. Luther, Special Assistant Attorneys General, with him,) for the Attorney General.

E. O. Proctor, for Bar Association of the City of Boston. M. A. Shattuck, for Massachusetts Bar Association.

A committee for the Bar Association of the County of Middlesex submitted a brief.

F. L. Simpson, for Keenan.

FIELD, C.J. The Attorney General of the Commonwealth offered for filing in the full court of the Supreme Judicial Court a document entitled an "information" relating to proceedings in the Superior Court upon the petition of Wilfred B. Keenan -- previously disbarred from the office of attorney in the courts of the Commonwealth by a judgment of the Supreme Judicial Court -- for admission to the bar. The Massachusetts Bar Association and the Bar Association of the City of Boston each offered for filing a document also entitled an "information" of somewhat similar tenor. Each of these documents is hereinafter referred to as an "information." Each information concluded with the following: "Wherefore, the entire matter is submitted for such action as this court shall deem expedient in the interest[s] of the public welfare."

The full court without hearing arguments made the following order: "Whereas the Attorney General of the Commonwealth, The Bar Association of the City of Boston and The Massachusetts Bar Association, have each presented an information to the Supreme Judicial Court for the Commonwealth in the matter of the admission of Wilfred B. Keenan as an attorney and counsellor at law in the courts [313 Mass. 189] of the Commonwealth, and have requested that the said informations be entered of record in said court and that such action may be taken thereunder as the court may consider appropriate: It is ordered that the clerk receive the said informations and enter them upon the docket of the court, and that in the matter of each of said informations the said Wilfred B. Keenan shall appear and file all his pleadings in defence thereof by way of demurrer, plea, answer and otherwise as he may be advised, on or before the first Monday of August, 1942, and upon the filing of subsequent pleadings, if any, by the informants, the three informations and the pleadings thereunder shall be presented to the Full Court upon the informations and the pleadings for the determination of all issues raised thereby not involving the actual trial of issues of fact, and the clerk shall give notice to the said Wilfred B. Keenan of the filing of these informations and of this order by sending by registered mail to the said Wilfred B. Keenan a copy of this order." The said Wilfred B. Keenan, hereinafter referred to as the respondent, thereupon filed with respect to each of the so called informations a "plea to the jurisdiction" and, without waiving such "plea to the jurisdiction," a "demurrer." The cases then came on to be heard by the full court and were argued by brief and orally by counsel for the respondent, and by brief and orally by the Attorney General, by counsel for the Massachusetts Bar Association and by counsel for the Bar Association of the City of Boston, and a brief was filed by leave of court in behalf of the Bar Association of the County of Middlesex.

Many of the...