IN THE MATTER OF DISCIPLINARY PROCEEDINGS AGAINST EDGAR, 99-0062-D.

• Decision Date: 26 October 1999
• Docket Number: No. 99-0062-D.,99-0062-D.
• Parties: IN the MATTER OF DISCIPLINARY PROCEEDINGS AGAINST Jane A. EDGAR, Attorney at Law. BOARD OF ATTORNEYS PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY, Complainant, v. Jane A. EDGAR, Respondent.
• Court: Wisconsin Supreme Court

230 Wis.2d 205

601 N.W.2d 284

IN the MATTER OF DISCIPLINARY PROCEEDINGS AGAINST Jane A. EDGAR, Attorney at Law.

BOARD OF ATTORNEYS PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY, Complainant, v. Jane A. EDGAR, Respondent.

No. 99-0062-D.

Supreme Court of Wisconsin.

Filed October 26, 1999.

¶ 1. PER CURIAM.

We review the report of the referee recommending that the license of Jane A. Edgar to practice law in Wisconsin be suspended for two years as discipline for professional misconduct. That misconduct consisted of Attorney Edgar's having converted some $11,000 of funds belonging to a client and to an adverse party in a divorce action, commingling her own funds and client funds in her law office business account and making deposits into and disbursements from that account for her personal expenses, and having falsely certified that she had a trust account and maintained trust account and bank records in compliance with the applicable rules governing the conduct of attorneys. The referee recommended that the license suspension be retroactive to the date on which the court temporarily suspended Attorney Edgar's license to practice law pending disposition of this proceeding.

¶ 2. We determine that Attorney Edgar's conversion of client funds and funds belonging to a third person to her own use and her failure to hold property of a client and a third party in trust are sufficiently serious to warrant the recommended two-year license suspension. By that conduct, Attorney Edgar violated her fiduciary responsibility to her clients and others who were entitled to rely on her for the protection of their property.

¶ 3. Attorney Edgar was licensed to practice law in Wisconsin in 1985 and prior to the temporary suspension of her license, practiced in Milwaukee. She previously has not been the subject of a disciplinary proceeding. The referee, Attorney John R. Decker, made findings of fact and conclusions of law based on the parties' stipulations. ¶ 4. During her representation of a client in a divorce, Attorney Edgar received a check for approximately $106,000 as proceeds of the sale of the parties' home. On July 24, 1997, she opened a savings account with $100,000 of that amount in the names of her client, the adverse party, and herself as "escrow agent." She notified counsel for the adverse party of the existence of the account and distributed to the parties the balance of the sale proceeds and the funds from a tax refund check, three dividend checks, and earnest money, pursuant to their agreement.

¶ 5. Between September 26, 1997, and April 6, 1998, Attorney Edgar withdrew sums of $5,000, $4,000, and $2,000 from the savings account without the knowledge or consent of her client or the adverse party or his counsel. On April 20, 1998, she deposited $11,781 into that account.

¶ 6. When confronted by the adverse party's counsel concerning some $10,000 missing from the account, Attorney Edgar responded that she was "shocked" and asserted that she did not appropriate the money for her personal use but merely had withdrawn funds from the wrong account to pay business expenses. Contrary to those representations, the referee found that Attorney Edgar intentionally made those withdrawals and that they were not the result of inadvertence or mistake. Moreover, Attorney Edgar's deposit of $11,781 constituted her replacement of the funds she had converted plus what she computed to be interest lost as a result of her unauthorized withdrawals.

¶ 7. In the course of its investigation into her conduct, the Board requested copies of Attorney Edgar's bank records of her client trust account. Incomplete copies of bank records were provided in response to that request, and Attorney Edgar acknowledged that she did not maintain a general client trust account but instead used separate interest-bearing accounts for funds held for significant periods of time.

¶ 8. Records of her business account disclosed that Attorney Edgar had improperly used that account for the deposit and disbursement of client funds for payment of her personal expenses. On her 1996-97 and 1997-98 State Bar dues statements, she falsely listed that business account as her client trust account and certified falsely that she maintained all required records of trust account transactions, when in fact she did not keep individual client ledgers or monthly reconciliation bank statements.

¶ 9. The referee also found that Attorney Edgar has been diagnosed as suffering from depression, for which she sought and has complied with treatment and remains on medication. The referee found further that Attorney Edgar made full restitution of the loss of funds occasioned by her misconduct within one week after being confronted with the unexplained shortfall in her bank account, which was two months prior to the Board's initiation of its inquiry into her conduct.

¶ 10. On the basis of those facts, the referee concluded that by converting client funds and funds belonging to an adverse party from an escrow account, Attorney Edgar engaged in misconduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation, in violation of SCR 20:8.4(c),¹ and failed to hold property of a client...