In re Mills

• Decision Date: 27 November 1918
• Docket Number: 14891.
• Citation: 176 P. 556,104 Wash. 278
• Parties: In re MILLS.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

176 P. 556

104 Wash. 278

In re MILLS.

No. 14891.

Supreme Court of Washington

November 27, 1918

Department 1.

Proceeding for the disbarment of Edgar G. Mills. Defendant permanently disbarred, and his name stricken from the rolls.

W. V Tanner, of Olympia, Frank P. Christensen, of Friday Harbor and R. M. Burgunder, of Colfax, for complainant.

Edgar G. Mills, C. E. Claypool, and C.J. France all of Seattle, for defendant.

TOLMAN J.

On January 23, 1918, a complaint was filed with the secretary of the state board of law examiners, charging Edgar C. Mills, a duly admitted attorney under the laws of this state, with unprofessional conduct as a member of the bar of this court because of his action in connection with a certain attempt at blackmail.

It appears that one F. J. Richards, who had long been employed as the manager of the Thompson Hotel Company of Lincoln, Neb., had acquired certain stock in that company, partly paid for, upon his interest in which he fixed a value of $24,000. Mr. Thompson was the holder of a majority of the stock of the hotel company, and there appears to have been no market value for the minority stock. Mr. Richards, evidently desiring to sever his connection with the hotel company in order to take employment as business manager with one Dr. Dechmann, who operated a sanitarium on Lake Crescent, in Clallam county, this state, desired to dispose of his stock in the hotel company at what he considered its value, and conceived the idea that he could not do so to any one other than Mr. Thompson. At the same time Dr. Dechmann was having trouble with Mr. Thompson over certain water rights. Thompson had previously been a patient at Dechmann's sanitarium and taken treatment there. For a time he expressed himself as pleased with the treatment, and then, appearing to become dissatisfied, left the sanitarium, and went to his summer home adjacent, and laid claim to the water which seems to have flowed through his property, which was used to supply the Dechmann sanitarium. Litigation arose over the water right between Dechmann and Thompson, and Mr. Mills was attorney for Dr. Dechmann in that litigation. Richards was interested in this litigation, and in Thompson's attitude toward Dr. Dechmann and his sanitarium, because of his plan of allying himself with Dr. Dechmann's interests, and he desired to settle the controversy over the water right in Dr. Dechmann's favor by obtaining a 99-year lease of the Thompson property, and obtain a statement from Thompson with reference to Dr. Dechmann's ability and method of treating diseases which would be of value in the future to both Dr. Dechmann and himself. Under these conditions Mr. Mills proposed to Dr. Dechmann that he would go to Thompson over the head of Thompson's attorney, and try to settle the dispute over the water right, and Dechmann advised him to wait a while, as Richards had some plan for adjusting matters, and it would be well to consider that plan before anything else was done. The other material facts will hereafter appear.

The constitutional questions raised by the defendant are disposed of against his contentions in Re Bruen, 172 P. 1152, and need not be here considered. The other technical objections and motions made by the defendant have been carefully considered, found not well taken, and, because of the length of this opinion, will not be further discussed.

The defendant in his brief says:

'You cannot convict or disbar unless it is shown that the acts were knowingly done, and the evidence is undisputed that Mills did not know the contents of the package, and there is no finding that he did, and no evidence to that effect, and no ground for an impartial mind to so conclude.'

We quite agree with and adopt the legal conclusion that the acts must be shown to have been knowingly done in order to justify disbarment; but as to the evidence, we are reluctantly forced to take the opposite view. There was introduced in evidence two written statements, each signed by Edgar G. Mills (Exhibits 4 and 5), purporting to cover the facts in this case; and, according to the testimony, each of such exhibits was carefully read and corrected by Mr. Mills before he affixed his signature. Exhibit 4 was made at the time of the institution of a criminal prosecution for blackmail against Richards, Dechmann, and Mills, and Exhibit 5 was made some months later, after Richards and Dechmann had been tried on the charge, and Mr. Mills had testified in both trials as to the facts within his knowledge. The two statements do not differ in effect, though Exhibit 5 goes more into detail; and, while it may unduly extend this opinion, yet to avoid the possibility of its being thought or said that any evidence has been torn from its context to alter or affect its convincing force, we feel obliged to quote Exhibit 5 in full, which is as follows:

'In the Superior Court of the State of Washington in and for the County of Clallam.

'State of Washington, Plaintiff, v. Frank J. Richards and Louis Dechmann, Defendant.

'Statement of Edgar G. Mills.

'November 23, 1916, by Mr. S. C. Rose:

'Q. Now, then, Mr. Mills, if you will say--along the same line as your testimony in this proceeding of the state against Dechmann--when was the first conversation that you had with Dr. Dechmann that had anything to do with this Richards proposition? A. On or about the first part of June 1916.

'Q. Then what was that? A. That was when I told the Doctor that I was going to try and go over Trumbull's head and get ahold of Thompson, and see if we could not settle up this water dispute, and the Doctor then said to me, 'Wait awhile, Richards has some plan; let us see what that is and what he can do before you do anything.'

'Q. Did he say what the plan that Richards had would be calculated to do, or what Richards thought it would do, or what it would settle up? A. He said that Richards had some plan that he thought he could settle up everything. I then wrote Richards a letter about the Burkhardt title, and in that was a short paragraph in which I said the Doctor said to me that you have said to him that you have some plan whereby you expect to effect a settlement of all of the Doctor's trouble with Thompson. I said that conditions were getting into a bad shape as far as the Doctor was concerned; that I had to make frequent trips to Port Angeles and Lake Crescent, and that they were expensive, and that something drastic would have to be done soon. I think I got a reply to that--I am not sure about it though--that he was going to be in Seattle before long. He made no reference to any plan, but that was the answer to that letter. He did answer in regard to the Burkhardt title.

'Q. Had you met Richards up to this time? A. No; I had not.

'Q. Then what next was in connection with this thing? A. The next was when I was introduced to Richards at the Woman's Exchange in Seattle.

'Q. Tell us about that. A. I was at the Woman's Exhange either attending some political meeting or getting my dinner, I think perhaps both----

'Q. About what date was that? A. That was the Saturday or Sunday, I do not remember which. If it was Saturday, it was the Saturday of the second week before the 20th of July. If it was Sunday, it was the week preceding the week including the 20th. Anyway, Mr. and Mrs. Dechmann were there with Richards, and two or three others who were strangers to me, I think Germans also, and I was introduced to Richards.

'Q. Is it true, as you have said before, that Dechmann first called you to one side? A. I was just getting to that.

'Q. Were you introduced to Richards first before Dechmann called you to one side? A. I was introduced to Richards at the table, and shook hands with him. I had heard about him in 1915, because my older boy was at Lake Crescent, at Qui Si Sana, the same time as Richards was there.

'Q. And then what? A. Well, then, after I was introduced to Richards, and they finished their dinner, the Doctor called me to the other side to one of the side seats (they are arranged like Pullman tables), and said that Richards wanted a lawyer, and that he wanted to throw the business to me so that I would get the fee, and said, 'He has some kind of statement that he wants to give Thompson;' and that they wanted me to blue-pencil it; and then he called Richards over.

'Q. Did he state to you why it should be blue-penciled? A. The idea that I got was that he wanted it brought within the law of blackmail.

'Q. Did he use the term of 'blackmail'? A. I think he did. I am sure about the blue-penciling.

'Q. Are you sure he said blackmail or not? A. The word 'blackmail' was used; I am sure that Richards used the word 'blackmail.'

'Q. Did Dechmann use it before Richards was called over? A. I think he did. My recollection is that he did; I am sure that Richards did.

'Q. Was Dechmann there? A. Yes; Dechmann sat right there. The Doctor sat over against the wall, then Richards on the outside of the same seat, and I sat on the other side of the table. Richards wanted the laws of blackmail looked up under the laws of the state of Washington. The conversation was short there. Well, then I went to work in my office Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, until Friday afternoon, looking up the law of blackmail as suggested by Richards, and I not only looked it up in regard to the laws of the state of Washington, but I went into the Encyclopedia of Law.

'Q. Did Dechmann, prior to the time that he called Richards into your conversation, did he before say to you, in Richard's absence, while Richards was away, that Richards wanted you to look up the law of blackmail? A. My recollection is that he said that Richards was going to get up a statement, and wanted me to blue-pencil it, and bring it within the law of blackmail.

'Q. Then

...