Maryland State Bar Ass'n, Inc. v. Agnew

• Citation: 318 A.2d 811,271 Md. 543
• Parties: MARYLAND STATE BAR ASSOCIATION, INC. v. Spiro T. AGNEW. Misc. (Subtitle BV) 13.
• Decision Date: 02 May 1974
• Court: Court of Appeals of Maryland

Page 543

271 Md. 543

318 A.2d 811

MARYLAND STATE BAR ASSOCIATION, INC. v. Spiro T. AGNEW.

Misc. (Subtitle BV) 13.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

May 2, 1974.

E. Dale Adkins, Jr., Salisbury, and Leon H. A. Pierson, Baltimore, for Spiro T. Agnew, respondent.

Daniel W. Moylan, Hagerstown, and Alfred L. Scanlan, Washington, D. C., for Maryland State Bar Ass'n, Inc. Argued before MURPHY, C. J., DIGGES, LEVINE, and ELDRIDGE, JJ., and CHARLES E. ORTH, Jr., JAMES C. MORTON Jr., and C. AWDRY THOMPSON, JJ., specially assigned.

DIGGES, Judge.

On October 10, 1973, in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, Spiro T. Agnew, a member of the Maryland Bar and the respondent in this disciplinary proceeding, having just moments before resigned as Vice President of the United States, ¹ entered a plea of nolo contendere to a criminal information which charged him with violating the United States Internal Revenue Code of 1954, § 7201. More specifically, it was alleged that Mr. Agnew did 'willfully and knowingly attempt to evade and defeat a large part of the income tax due and owing by him and his wife to the United States of America for the calendar year 1967, by filing and causing to be filed . . . a false and fraudulent joint income tax return . . ..' Following the district court's acceptance of his plea to this felony charge, and after the allocution by Mr. Agnew to which we will later refer, Judge Walter E. Hoffman directed the entry of a final judgment suspending the imposition of sentence for a period of three years conditioned upon the respondent's good behavior and his payment of a $10,000 fine. ²

Alert to its responsibility to maintain the integrity of the legal system, the Maryland State Bar Association, acting pursuant to the provisions of Chapter 1100, Subtitle BV, of the Maryland Rules of Procedure, promptly, on November 12, 1973, instituted this disciplinary proceeding against the respondent in this Court. ³ By its petition, the Bar Association alleges that the final judgment in the United States District Court, convicting Mr. Agnew of willfully and fraudulently attempting to evade or defeat the payment of his federal income tax then due, constitutes conclusive proof of the commission of a crime involving moral turpitude and is conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice which warrants the imposition of disciplinary sanctions by this Court. Following the filing of this petition, as is permitted by Rule BV3 b, we ordered that the proceedings be transmitted to the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County for a hearing. By that same order, Judges Shirley B. Jones, Ridgely P. Melvin Jr., and William H. McCullough were designated as the panel of judges to conduct the hearing (Rule BV4) and return to this Court its findings and recommendation as to the proper disposition of the charges. In conscientious discharge of these assigned duties, that panel made the following findings and recommendation:

'The respondent has admitted his guilt of a crime involving moral turpitude. His conduct, characterized as it must be, as deceitful and dishonest, strikes at the heart of the basic object of the legal profession, and constitutes conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice. In our opinion, the proper administration of justice, the proper respect of the court for itself and a proper regard for the integrity of the profession compel us to conclude that the respondent is unfit to continue as a member of the bar of this state. We shall therefore recommend his disbarment. We see no extenuating circumstances allowing a lesser sanction.'

We commence our consideration of the panel's recommendation by referring to the statutory pronouncement of this Court's inherent common law power to regulate the conduct of those attorneys we admit to practice law in Maryland. In Re Meyerson, 190 Md. 671, 59 A.2d 489 (1948). That statute concisely states:

'Every attorney who shall, after having an opportunity to be heard . . . be found guilty of professional misconduct, malpractice, fraud, deceit crime involving moral turpitude, conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice, or of being a subversive person, as defined by the Subversive Activities Act of 1949, shall, by order of the judges finding him guilty, be suspended or disbarred from the practice of his profession in this State.' Maryland Code (1957, 1968 Repl.Vol.) Art. 10, § 16 ⁴ (emphasis added).

That the crime of willful tax evasion involves moral turpitude and constitutes conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice was settled in this State by our predecessors nearly thirty years ago in Rheb v. Bar Ass'n of Baltimore, 186 Md. 200, 46 A.2d 289 (1946), and we reaffirm the reasoning of that landmark case as being applicable to the charge here. Although courts of some other jurisdictions have arrived at a contrary conclusion, we note that the weight of authority seems to support the result reached in that case. See In Re Teitelbaum, 13 Ill.2d 586, 150 N.E.2d 873 (1958); In Re Alker, 398 Pa. 188, 157 A.2d 749 (1960); In Re Mann, 151 W.Va. 644, 154 S.E.2d 860 (1967). The respondent does not question the binding effect of the Rheb decision in these proceedings, nor does he question that under Rule BV4 f 1 ⁵ the final judgment in the United States District Court following the nolo contendere plea is conclusive proof of his guilt of the crime charged. Instead, Mr. Agnew has consistently confined his contentions, both before the hearing panel and in his exceptions to its recommendation, to a discussion of the proper sanction to be imposed. He asserts that disbarment would be unduly harsh and that suspension for an appropriate amount of time is more reasonable. In addition, he states that rarely have the courts of this nation or the circuit courts of this State ordered that the extreme sanction be prescribed in a case involving willful tax evasion, and that crimes which victimize the public in general, rather than an attorney's own client, should not result in the imposition of this form of discipline. In light of these concessions and arguments we now address ourselves to a consideration of the appropriate sanction to be imposed here.

The reports of judicial opinions throughout the nation and the learned writings by members of the profession are rife with pronouncements concerning the professional ethical responsibilities of a lawyer. Nevertheless, little else benefits the legal community more from repetition than does a recitation of an attorney's high moral obligation. As was said long ago in what many consider to be the leading treatise on the subject of legal ethics,

'No man can ever be a truly great lawyer, who is not in every sense of the word, a good man . . .. There is no profession in which moral character is so soon fixed as in that of the law; there is none in which it is subjected to severer scrutiny by the public . . .. From the very commencement of a lawyer's career, let him cultivate, above all things, truth, simplicity and candor; they are the cardinal virtues of a lawyer.' G. Sharswood, Professional Ethics 168, 169 (1844).

Few vocations offer as great a spectrum for good and honorable works as does the legal profession. The attorney is entrusted with the life savings and investments of his clients. He becomes the guardian of the mentally deficient, and potential savior for the accused. He is a fiduciary, a confidant, an advisor, and an advocate. However, the great privilege of serving in all of these capacities does not come without the concomitant responsibilities of truth, candor and honesty. In fact, it can be said that the presence of these virtues in members of the bar comprises a large portion of the fulcrum upon which the scales of justice rest. Consequently, an attorney's character must remain beyond reproach.

A court has the duty, since attorneys are its officers, to insist upon the maintenance of the integrity of the bar and to prevent the transgressions of an individual lawyer from bringing its image into disrepute. Disciplinary procedures have been established for this purpose, not for punishment, but rather as a catharsis for the profession and a prophylactic for the public. Balliet v. Balto. Co. Bar Ass'n, 259 Md. 474, 270 A.2d 465 (1970). The administration of justice under our adversary system largely depends upon the public's ability to rely on the honesty of attorneys who are placed in a position of being called upon to conduct the affairs of others both in and out of court. Although a court's power to disbar should be exercised only with restraint, '(w)hen . . . unworthiness is shown to be present . . . it becomes our sad duty, but nonetheless our obligation, to withdraw the privilege to practice law earlier granted by this Court. To fail to do so will impliedly represent to the public that the attorney continues to possess the basic qualities of honor traditionally associated with members of the bar of this State.' Bar Ass'n v. Marshall, 269 Md. 510, 519-20, 307 A.2d 677, 682 (1973). In a proceeding such as this, therefore, the underlying question is 'whether, after the conduct of this man, it is proper that he should continue (as) a member of (the legal) profession . . .' Ex parte Brownshall, 2 Cowp. 829 (1778). In the absence of a compelling exculpatory explanation, we think that the answer to this question must be no when an attorney is found guilty of a crime which is deemed to involve moral turpitude and the offense entails the employment of dishonesty, fraud, or deceit which is perpetrated to enrich the offending attorney or to enhance his own well-being at the expense of his client, the state, or any other individual.

As can be discerned from this statement, we see no significant moral distinction between willfully defrauding and cheating for personal gain a client, an individual, or the government. Cheating one's client and defrauding the government are reprehensible in equal...