Summary
The Florida Supreme Court reviewed disciplinary proceedings involving attorneys Mark Enrique Rousso and Leonardo Adrian Roth arising from extensive trust-account deficiencies and embezzlement by a nonlawyer bookkeeper. The court found violations involving trust-account management, commingling, conflicts of interest, and dishonesty or misrepresentation, and imposed disbarment rather than the referee’s recommended suspensions. The court also rejected the referee’s reduction of costs awarded to The Florida Bar.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the respondents violated Rule Regulating the Florida Bar 5-1.1(a)(1) by depositing personal funds and borrowed funds into the trust account.
- Whether the respondents received adequate notice and procedural due process concerning the alleged violations of Rule 4-8.4(c).
- Whether twelve- and fifteen-month suspensions were appropriate sanctions for the respondents' trust-account and related misconduct.
- Whether readmission could properly be conditioned on satisfaction and release of the respondents' debt to client Yordi.
- Whether the referee abused discretion by reducing the Bar's recoverable costs through an equitable adjustment.
Holdings
- Depositing personal funds and loan proceeds into a client trust account constitutes commingling in violation of Rule Regulating the Florida Bar 5-1.1(a)(1), even when the deposits are intended to cover shortages caused by an employee's embezzlement.
- The respondents received constitutionally sufficient notice because the complaints alleged the underlying conduct and identified Rule 4-8.4(c); the Bar was not required to connect every alleged item of misconduct to a specific rule violation.
- Disbarment, rather than suspension or permanent disbarment, was the appropriate sanction for the respondents' serious trust-account mismanagement, commingling, conflicts of interest, dishonesty, and related misconduct.
- The respondents' readmission may be conditioned on demonstrating that they fulfilled their settlement agreement with client Yordi.
- The referee abused discretion by reducing the Bar's taxable costs through an equitable adjustment; the respondents' inability to pay did not justify reducing the award.
Key quotations
“A lawyer’s responsibility for safekeeping of trust account funds cannot be delegated to a non-lawyer employee of the firm.” (761)
“Respondents cannot abdicate, by delegation to the bookkeeper, the ultimate responsibility for trust account maintenance.” (767)
“The choice is between imposing the costs of discipline on those who have violated our Rules of Professional Conduct or on the membership of the Bar who have not.” (769)
Factual background
Hundreds of millions of dollars passed through the respondents' law firm's trust account, which developed an approximately $4.38 million deficit after a nonlawyer bookkeeper embezzled funds over an extended period. Rousso and Roth failed to maintain required trust-account records and procedures, allowed personal funds and borrowed funds to be deposited into the trust account, and continued representing clients and accepting new client money without disclosing that the account was seriously underfunded. Roth also obtained a personal loan exceeding $231,000 from client Fernando Horigian Yordi by exchanging a portion of Yordi's trust-account credit for a promissory note, which the respondents later defaulted on.
Procedural history
The Florida Bar filed separate disciplinary complaints against Rousso and Roth, and the matters were consolidated before a referee. The referee recommended findings of guilt on several violations, suspensions of twelve and fifteen months, and reduced costs. The Supreme Court of Florida approved the factual findings and most guilt recommendations, found an additional commingling violation, rejected the recommended suspensions, imposed disbarments, and awarded the Bar its full requested costs.