People v. Bauder, 96SA472
| Decision Date | 14 July 1997 |
| Docket Number | No. 96SA472,96SA472 |
| Citation | 941 P.2d 282 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Complainant, v. Fred BAUDER, Attorney-Respondent. |
| Court | Colorado Supreme Court |
Linda Donnelly, Disciplinary Counsel, James C. Coyle, Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, Denver, for Complainant.
Fred Bauder, Crestone, pro se.
A hearing panel of the supreme court grievance committee approved the findings and recommendation of a hearing board that the respondent in this lawyer discipline case receive a private censure. The assistant disciplinary counsel has excepted on the ground that private discipline is unduly lenient under the circumstances of this case. We agree and publicly censure the respondent.
The respondent was licensed to practice law in this state in 1976. Based on the evidence presented, the hearing board found that the following had been established by clear and convincing evidence.
In December 1993, a client hired the respondent to represent him in a dissolution of marriage proceeding. The respondent filed the petition for dissolution on February 25, 1994, in the district court for Alamosa County. The client's wife executed a waiver of service of process and submitted to the jurisdiction of the court. The client and his wife owned a house in San Acacio, Colorado, where the client lived with the children of the marriage and with his girlfriend while the dissolution proceeding was pending. When the client's wife visited Colorado during this period of time, she also stayed at the house. Both women testified that in May 1994 the respondent telephoned the house and asked to speak to his client. The client's girlfriend answered the phone and told the respondent that his client was not there. The client's wife then got on the phone.
The client's wife testified that the respondent initially spoke to her about issues related to the dissolution. The wife was not represented by counsel at that time. However, the respondent then turned the conversation to sexual matters, eventually proposing that he and the two women meet for a sexual rendezvous. The client's wife also said that the respondent raised a question as to the price the women would charge him for their sexual favors. The client's girlfriend testified that she remained in the room while the respondent was talking to his client's wife, and that although she could not hear what the respondent was saying, what she did hear supported the wife's testimony.
The women reported the incident to the respondent's client who became angry and terminated the lawyer-client relationship by retaining another lawyer. The hearing board found that the dissolution proceeding eventually concluded with an agreement between the parties and that neither party suffered actual harm as a result of the respondent's telephone call.
The respondent vigorously denied that he had engaged in such a conversation with either of the women, or that he had solicited or attempted to solicit sex from either of them. Nevertheless, the hearing board found the women's testimony more credible than the respondent's testimony.
The hearing board concluded that the respondent's conduct during the telephone call violated section 18-7-202(1)(a), 8B C.R.S. (1986), which prohibits soliciting for the purpose of prostitution, and makes solicitation a class 3 misdemeanor, see § 18-7-202(2), 8A C.R.S. (1986). The foregoing conduct violated Colo. RPC 1.7(b) (); Colo. RPC 8.4(b) (); as well as C.R.C.P. 241.6(3) (...
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Lawyer Disciplinary Bd. v. Artimez
...representation will not be adversely affected; and (2) the client consents after consultation.... See, e.g., People v. Bauder, 941 P.2d 282 (Colo.1997) [ (en banc) (per curiam)] (attorney propositioned client's wife and client's [2.] By paying his client, in part, not to take any action whi......
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Iowa Supreme Court Attorney Disciplinary Bd. v. Moothart
...Colorado Supreme Court considered a case in which an attorney sexually solicited the wife of a dissolution client. 941 P.2d 282, 282–83 (Colo.1997) (en banc) (per curiam). The Colorado court concluded that “while the women involved were not themselves clients of the respondent, the responde......
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Disciplinary Counsel v. Owen
...an attorney has been disciplined for making sexual advances to a client's spouse in a telephone conversation. See People v. Bauder, 941 P.2d 282 (Colo.1997) (publicly censuring attorney who solicited prostitution during telephone call with wife of his client in dissolution of marriage). {¶ ......
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Bauder, In re, 98SA447
...Bauder for soliciting for prostitution during a phone call with the wife of a dissolution of marriage client. See People v. Bauder, 941 P.2d 282, 283 (Colo.1997). Bauder was ordered to pay the costs of that proceeding in the amount of $2,058.97 within thirty days of the date on the opinion.......
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Out of Bounds: Boundary Issues in the Practice of Law
...1362-65 (Colo. 1997) (lawyer suspended for six months for engaging in sexual relationship with two separate clients); People v. Bauder, 941 P.2d 282, 282-84 (Colo. 1997) (where lawyer represented husband in dissolution, lawyer violated fiduciary relationship with client by proposing to clie......