Opinion
No. 92-261
Submitted May 5, 1992 —
Decided August 26, 1992.
ON REPORT of the Board of Commissioners on Character and Fitness of the Supreme Court, No. 56.
In 1983, Robert Timothy Hatton applied for admission to the Ohio Bar, but his name was removed from the applicant lists for the February and July 1984 examinations because he did not schedule, and then scheduled and cancelled, a character and fitness interview. Hatton took the Kentucky Bar Examination, however, and was admitted to the practice of law there in 1984. Hatton voluntarily resigned his Kentucky license as of May 31, 1988.
On October 26, 1989, Hatton updated his 1984 application for admission to the Ohio Bar by filing responses to a supplemental character questionnaire. The Cincinnati Bar Association ("CBA") conducted a character and fitness interview of Hatton in January 1990, but determined that it could not approve Hatton's application without further information. Hatton filed responses to a second supplemental character questionnaire in March 1990, his objective being to take the July 1990 Ohio Bar Exam. He asked for expedited consideration of his Ohio application because he had also applied for reinstatement to the Kentucky Bar, and efforts to obtain the results of that investigation into his character and fitness had delayed the CBA's investigation.
Pursuant to the authority in Gov.Bar R. I(9)(B)(2)(e), a panel of the Board of Commissioners on Character and Fitness of the Supreme Court heard the matter of Hatton's application on November 26, 1991. The evidence presented to the panel established, among other things, the following:
1. In 1984, Hatton and a partner, another recent graduate who had been admitted to the practice of law in Ohio, maintained law offices in this state and Kentucky, purportedly to facilitate each partner's practice in the state bar of his admission. The partnership broke up in 1987, however, and Hatton continued, even after his resignation from the Kentucky Bar, to maintain an Ohio office using a letterhead that represented his status as an attorney at law at that address.
2. Although never admitted to the practice of law in Texas or Louisiana, Hatton represented clients in these states for the purpose of litigation instituted in federal courts of the region. Hatton continued to represent at least one of these clients after he resigned his Kentucky license.
3. Hatton consistently failed to respond completely to questions about his involvement in legal proceedings since his 1984 application to the Ohio Bar. Ultimately, the panel learned that (a) he had been sued for malpractice and misrepresentation by former clients in a Texas district court, (b) he had filed unmeritorious complaints with the Kentucky Bar against his former law partner and against a former Kentucky county prosecutor, (c) he had been cited for speeding in Ohio and had failed to pay the ticket or appear in court before a warrant was issued for his arrest, (d) his outstanding debts had caused him to file bankruptcy, (e) he had been sued several times in Kentucky and had at least two outstanding judgments, (f) he had filed a civil rights suit based on events that led to his conviction in Kentucky for reckless driving and resisting arrest, and (g) he had been sanctioned for filing a frivolous appeal by a Kentucky court of appeals and had just missed being cited for contempt, apparently because he resigned his Kentucky license before the court issued a contempt order.
4. Hatton resigned his license to practice law in Kentucky not only to avoid being held in contempt, but also to avoid that state's continuing legal education requirement and registration dues.
The evidence before the panel also established that Hatton handled his clients' and his own affairs irresponsibly. The panel cited Hatton's acceptance, almost immediately after his graduation from law school, of several complex multiparty land rights cases in Texas and Louisiana against major corporate defendants. Hatton, along with his partner, accepted these cases primarily on a contingent fee basis, and for none of them did he possess the expertise, experience, or resources needed to support the years of investigation and proceedings the cases would require. In one of these cases, Hatton and his partner arranged for clients to advance expenses and salary and promised to deduct the paid amount, which may have been as high as $155,000, from the contingent fee to be paid upon a favorable final judgment.
None of the Texas and Louisiana clients was successful due to Hatton's representation, however, and Hatton was eventually either discharged or forced to withdraw in most of the cases. Moreover, Hatton's personal and professional finances became so depleted during the course of this representation that he sold interests in contingency fees in one of the cases to clients in another case in return for approximately $65,000 in loans. Hatton then filed bankruptcy, mainly because of the debt he had incurred in representing the Texas and Louisiana clients and the liability he anticipated from the malpractice action that some of them had filed.
The panel concluded from this evidence that Hatton had not shown the good character required for admission to the Ohio Bar and, therefore, it recommended that his application be disapproved. Moreover, because the panel considered Hatton to have no appreciation for the ethical standards a practicing lawyer should possess, the panel further recommended that he be barred from reapplying for admission to the practice of law in Ohio. The board adopted the panel's findings and its recommendation.
Robert Timothy Hatton, pro se. Rendigs, Fry, Kiely Dennis and David Winchester Peck, for the Cincinnati Bar Association.
Having thoroughly reviewed the record, we agree with the board's finding that Robert Timothy Hatton has not shown the good character required for admission to the Ohio Bar. We also agree with the board's recommendation. Therefore, Hatton's application is disapproved, and he is barred from reapplying for admission to the practice of law in this state.
Order accordingly.
MOYER, C.J., SWEENEY, HOLMES, DOUGLAS, WRIGHT, H. BROWN and RESNICK, JJ., concur.