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Thompson Hine LLP, a full-service business law firm with approximately 400 lawyers in 11 offices, was ranked number 1 in the category “Most innovative North American law firms: New working models” by The Financial Times and was 1 of 7 firms shortlisted for The American Lawyer’s inaugural Legal Services Innovation Award. The firm has been recognized by the National Law Journal as a Legal Technology Trailblazer and featured by Bloomberg for its innovative service delivery models, which drive accuracy and predictability. The firm’s commitment to innovation is embodied in Thompson Hine SmartPaTHTM – a smarter way to work – predictable, efficient and aligned with client goals. For more information, please visit ThompsonHine.com and ThompsonHine.com/SmartPaTH.

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<img style="max-width: 100%;height: auto;max-width: 100%;height: auto" loading="lazy" class="alignright size-full wp-image-3800" src="https://www.thelawforlawyerstoday.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/754/2018/02/Lying.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="300">In the&nbsp;ethics class that&nbsp;I teach as&nbsp;an adjunct law prof, I refer to <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_rules_of_professional_conduct/rule_8_4_misconduct.html">Model Rule 8.4(c)</a> as &ldquo;The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,&rdquo; because of the four things the rule&nbsp;prohibits:&nbsp; dishonesty, fraud, deceit and misrepresentation.
While these ethical no-no&rsquo;s are certainly not&nbsp;equivalent to the biblical &ldquo;four horsemen&rdquo; (Death, Famine, War and Conquest), violating Rule 8.4(c) can have a bad&nbsp;(if not apocalyptic) effect&nbsp;on your law license, as lawyers in Rhode Island and Oklahoma recently discovered in two separate disciplinary cases &mdash; each involving&nbsp;false documents.
False deeds = misdeed
In the Rhode Island case, the lawyer was counsel to a homeowner association that managed&nbsp;a timeshare development.&nbsp; If&nbsp;a time-share owner failed to pay annual maintenance fees, the association could&nbsp;foreclose on the delinquent party&rsquo;s interest in the property, and&nbsp;the lawyer regularly represented the&nbsp;client in these&nbsp;foreclosure proceedings.
The foreclosure process involved preparing a deed for&nbsp;execution by the client&rsquo;s authorized officer.&nbsp; The&nbsp;signature was to be witnessed by a notary public; after being properly executed, the foreclosure deed was recorded.
To expedite the process, the lawyer&nbsp;began signing the client&rsquo;s president&rsquo;s name&nbsp;on the foreclosure deeds, and then acting as the notary witness to the false signature.&nbsp; The lawyer then caused the falsely-executed documents to be recorded.
After these actions&nbsp;came to light during unrelated litigation, the lawyer self-reported to&nbsp;the state disciplinary authority, and the supreme court&nbsp;issued its <a href="https://www.courts.ri.gov/Courts/SupremeCourt/SupremeOrders/17-258.pdf">opinion</a>&nbsp;publically reprimanding the lawyer&nbsp;for violating the state&rsquo;s version of <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_rules_of_professional_conduct/rule_4_1_truthfulness_in_statements_to_others.html">Model Rule 4.1</a> (truthfulness in statements to others) and <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_rules_of_professional_conduct/rule_8_4_misconduct.html">Rule 8.4</a> &mdash; the four horsemen.&nbsp; (The relatively light penalty stemmed from the lawyer&rsquo;s &ldquo;lengthy unblemished history&rdquo; and &ldquo;heartfelt remorse.&rdquo;)
If you are like most lawyers, you&rsquo;re a notary; and maybe you&nbsp;think that you&rsquo;d never falsely sign or notarize a document.&nbsp;&nbsp;But it&rsquo;s possible that the lawyer&rsquo;s actions here were aimed at not&nbsp;bothering the client&rsquo;s executive officers.&nbsp; And imagined or real pressure to avoid inconveniencing clients can tend to disorient even the best&nbsp;lawyer&rsquo;s ethical compass.
I get teased by&nbsp;relatives when I refuse to notarize car titles they present to me after they&rsquo;ve signed them.&nbsp; Start by resisting your relatives, and you&rsquo;ll likely be able to resist any temptation to execute or notarize a document falsely!
Turning back the hands of time...
In the Oklahoma case, the grievance was filed by a county judge, who reported that the lawyer had turned back the date on the court clerk&rsquo;s file stamp to make it seem that a pleading had been filed on April 15, when actually it had not been submitted&nbsp;until April 19.&nbsp; The lawyer admitted the misconduct, and pointed to three other instances when the lawyer &ldquo;may have&rdquo; done the same thing.
The supreme court&rsquo;s short&nbsp;<a href="https://law.justia.com/cases/oklahoma/supreme-court/2018/scbd-6496.html">opinion</a> fails to explain what happened here, or the circumstances that made it possible&nbsp;for a lawyer to dial back a clerk&rsquo;s time-stamp (not something that would be physically possible in my bailiwick).&nbsp; But significantly, while disciplinary counsel&nbsp;and the lawyer&rsquo;s counsel stipulated to a penalty consisting of a public reprimand, the trial panel&nbsp;rejected that proposal and recommended a six-month actual suspension, instead.
The panel observed that intentionally backdating an official court document is a serious offense deserving of more than a public reprimand.
The state supreme court agreed, adding that&nbsp;&ldquo;such conduct is the type of dishonesty, deceit and misrepresentation while engaged in the practice of law that is forbidden&rdquo; by the Sooner State&rsquo;s version of Model Rule 8.4.
It&rsquo;s hard to derive a moral from this case, without knowing more of the background.&nbsp; But one thing is for sure:&nbsp; any time you are tempted to get on any of those four horses, you should ride the other way.

core/freeform

Ethics

Legal Ethics, Professional Responsibility and the Business of Law

Apocalypse now?  Two tales of dishonesty, fraud, deceit, misrepresentation