People ex rel. Chicago Bar Ass'n v. Ader

• Decision Date: 23 April 1914
• Docket Number: No. 7704.,7704.
• Citation: 263 Ill. 319,104 N.E. 1060
• Parties: PEOPLE ex rel. CHICAGO BAR ASS'N v. ADER.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

263 Ill. 319

104 N.E. 1060

PEOPLE ex rel. CHICAGO BAR ASS'N

v.ADER.

No. 7704.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

April 23, 1914.

Disbarment proceedings by the People, on the relation of the Chicago Bar Association, against Edward J. Ader. Judgment of suspension.

John L. Fogle, of Chicago, for relator.

Joseph W. Merriam, of Chicago (Edward D. Shurtleff, of Chicago, of counsel), for respondent.

FARMER, J.

This is a proceeding instituted for the disbarment of Edward J. Ader, a member of the bar of this state practicing his profession in the city of Chicago. The amended information contains ten counts or charges. Most of them relate to alleged misconduct and dishonest practices in making loans to various persons. Two counts charge the respondent with misconduct and making a false affidavit in procuring the incorporation of the United States Trust company. Respondent answered the information, denying substantially all the charges therein except the making of an affidavit that all the stock of the United States Trust Company was paid up when, in fact, none of it was paid. The cause was referred to a special commissioner to take and report the proof, together with his conclusions of law and fact. The commissioner heard the evidence and reported that in his opinion the testimony sustained charges in the information that respondent had been guilty of unprofessional and dishonorable conduct.

The most of the great mass of evidence heard by the commissioner relates to the charges of misconduct of respondent in connection with loans alleged to have been made by him and one Lyman W. Rogers to various persons. As to most of the transactions charged against respondent in connection with the money loaning business the proof consists of the testimony of respondent and Rogers. Their testimony is in hopeless and irreconcilable conflict. Rogers testified respondent was engaged with him in the business and furnished the greater portion of the money that was loaned. This is flatly denied by respondent. The record shows-indeed, the testimony of Rogers himself shows-him to be a man without integrity of character and so unreliable that we would not be willing to rest a judgment against any one upon his testimony, alone. He was in 1909 and 1910 a first-year student in a night law school. For a time in the fall of 1909 he was employed as a clerk by Charles Cattern, a lawyer, who had desk room in respondent's office. Cattern left Chicago, but Rogers remained in the respondent's office without any special arrangement or agreement until February, 1910, when he was employed in another law office as clerk. He was engaged in making small loans to real estate owners and taking quitclaim deeds as security. He charged the borrower $23 on each $100 loaned, in addition to 6 per cent. interest. This business he carried on in respondent's office, which was in the Stock Exchange building, 108 La Salle street. He made a good many loans during the spring and early summer of 1910. As to one loan made during that period, other testimony than that of Rogers connects respondent with it in a way that we think merits censure. The loan we refer to is known in the record as the Horne-Bowser loan. Mrs. Horne had formerly been married to a man named Bowser, who died in 1889, leaving her as his widow and one son as his only child surviving him. Mrs. Horne seeing an advertisement in the Chicago Daily News in the name of respondent, 108 La Salle street, offering to loan small amounts of money to property owners without mortgage, at 6 per cent. Interest, went to respondent's office. She testified she had two interviews with him before she saw Rogers, but that respondent told her she could get the loan and that Rogers was attending to that branch of the business. On her third visit to respondent's office, accompanied by her son, she saw Rogers, who prepared a note for $295, which she and her son signed. She and her son also signed a quitclaim deed conveying their property to Rogers and he gave her $250 in money. It would serve no useful purpose to respondent or to the profession for us to set out in detail the evidence of respondent's improper conduct in connection with this loan, and, in view of the conclusion we have reached, we deem it inadvisable to do so. It is sufficient to say that the Horne-Bowser note was disposed of by Rogers to one Dr. Burmaster. Before its maturity respondent wrote Mrs. Horne telling her when the note would become due and stating Rogers desired the money to invest in other business. This letter was written in September. On the 29th of July previous, Rogers had conveyed the property by quitclaim deed to respondent's wife but the deed was not placed on record until October 8th. On receipt of respondent's letter Mrs. Horne applied to a real estate firm for a loan of $1,200 on the property, and an investigation of the title by the real estate agents disclosed that the record showed it to be in Rogers. They saw Rogers about it, and he claimed the payment of $60 before he would make a quitclaim deed, and this was paid him. About that time they found respondent or his wife claimed to have title to the property to secure an indebtedness, as respondent claimed, from Rogers to him of $352.50. This sum they were required to pay before respondent's wife would execute a quitclaim deed. Respondent had no note for the amount he claimed Rogers owed him, and the loan agents were not informed that the note Mrs. Horne and her son had given was in existence and owned by Burmaster. Mrs. Horne and her son were ignorant of business matters and claim they signed what Rogers told them to when the loan was secured but did not really know what they signed. Rogers claimed he borrowed $100 or $200 for the benefit of respondent during respondent's absence in New York and gave the note to Burmaster as security. Burmaster testified he bought the note and paid for it and did not hold it as security for any loan that had been wholly or in part paid. In January, 1911, Burmaster took a judgment by confession against Mrs. Horne and her son for $325, and that judgment remains unsatisfied and...