Suspended attorney accused of stealing funds from local client

Kenneth Service

MUNCIE, Ind. – An attorney being held without bond in the Delaware County jail is accused of stealing more than $23,000 from a local client.

Kenneth S. Service, 46, of Greenwood, was arrested Jan. 16 on a warrant Delaware Circuit Court 1 Judge Marianne Vorhees had issued last September.

In June 2018, Service was charged with theft, a Class D felony carrying up to three years in prison.

Authorities allege Service took $23,622 from the Delaware Count client between April 2014 and June 2016. A guardianship for that woman had been established in 2003, when she was a juvenile.

The Indiana Supreme Court suspended Service from acting as an attorney in 2017 after he allegedly refused to cooperate in a state  investigation of allegations against him.

Service's legal woes are not limited to Delaware County. He also faces related theft charges in Lawrence, Franklin and Marion counties. 

In all, Service is accused of stealing more than a quarter-million dollars from the trusts of special needs clients.

He also faces lawsuits alleging he took funds from clients in Allen, LaPorte and Wabash counties, according to The Indiana Lawyer, a website on the state legal system.

Service operated the National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity Inc., of Carmel, but was fired by that organization in 2014.

Vorhees issued the warrant for his arrest in the local case last September after he failed to appear for a pre-trial hearing.

A hearing on the local case is set for Feb. 3.

There is also a warrant for Service's arrest in Marion County, where he was charged last May with corrupt business influence and three counts of theft.

His trial on a theft charge in Lawrence Superior Court 1 is set for April 1.

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Suspended attorney accused of stealing funds from local client

See Also:
Special needs trust lawyer faces another theft charge

Lawyer accused of stealing from special-needs trusts

Suspended NKY attorney accused of taking funds from dead woman's estate

Dale Anthony Brinker

A suspended Fort Wright attorney has been charged with stealing from clients' estates, according to prosecutors. 

On Wednesday, Dale Anthony Brinker, 60, was charged with two counts of felony theft after a complaint about suspected misappropriation of funds entrusted to Brinker, according to the Kenton County Commonwealth's Attorney.

Prosecutors said the Kentucky Bar Association lists Brinker as a "former member" and said he has been suspended from the practice of law since 2010.

According to the arrest warrant, Joan Siemer signed a will that was prepared by Brinker in 1994. When Siemer died in February 2006, the money did not go to heirs, instead, $110,000 sat in a bank account.

In January, two transfers of $10,000 were made to accounts controlled by Brinker and one $5,000 check was cashed by Brinker, police said. 

Commonwealth's Attorney Rob Sanders said prosecutors are seeking the public's assistance to locate the heirs of Siemer's estate.

Sanders said investigators are looking into at least two other complaints of allegedly misappropriated funds.

Sanders advises anyone concerned about Brinker to contact Kentucky State Police.

Anyone who believes they have information which would assist in the investigation or who may be a victim, should contact Detective Charles Hazelwood at Kentucky State Police Post 6 in Dry Ridge at 859-428-1212.

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Suspended NKY attorney accused of taking funds from dead woman's estate

Legal woes adding up for suspended Chesco lawyer

Joshua Adam Janis

WEST CHESTER — As of noon Friday, a total of 30 individuals had been publicly identified by authorities as alleged victims of suspended Chester County attorney Joshua Adam Janis. By 1:30 p.m., the number had grown to 31.

This time, the target of his alleged theft was his former mother-in-law, an East Goshen woman from whom he is now accused of stealing about $5,000 by falsely applying for a line of credit using her personal identification and that of a business she co-owned with her daughter, who herself has been identified as one of Janis’s victims.

Chester County Detectives Gerald Davis Jr. and Sgt. Robert Dougherty filed a criminal complaint containing the new allegations following a preliminary hearing before District Judge Bret Binder on charges that Janis — whose license to practice law was suspended by the Pennsylvania Disciplinary Board in December 2015 — had improperly taken money from three women who had hired him to represent them in family law matters in 2014 and 2015.

It was the fifth such arrest for Janis, 38, who now lives with his family in New Jersey, since July 2018. Clients Janis allegedly bilked are from Chester, Montgomery and Berks counties.

The hearing before Binder lasted more than 2½ hours before the two sides concluded their presentations, but without a resolution. Binder took the unusual step of saying that he would wait two weeks before announcing whether he would hold Janis on all, some, or none of the theft charges against him.

The judge explained that the issues involved in the case were complex enough that he wanted the additional time to study the law involved and mull over the facts presented by the prosecution and the arguments made by Janis’ defense attorney.

In general, Chief Deputy District Attorney Ronald Yen, who is heading the prosecution against Janis on all the myriad charges against him, said that Janis had illegally taken money paid to him by the three women by not depositing it in a so-called “lawyers trust account,” as is described by the state’s Rules of Professional Conduct.

Funds deposited in such accounts are meant to be withdrawn as an attorney completes work on a client’s case, with proper billing identifying the withdrawals sent to the client. In the cases of the three women, Yen argued, he had instead put the fees in his own bank account and used them as his own.

“Mr. Janis put moneys he was required to hold in trust into his own account and he spent it,” Yen said in a closing argument Friday in Binder’s courtroom at the Chester County Justice Center. “He took those funds and used them as his own when he knew he could not. It is not his money. It is the client’s money.”

But attorney Dan McGarrigle of Media, representing Janis, argued strongly that the prosecution was attempting to transform what should be either a civil suit or a disciplinary matter into a criminal case.

“They haven’t proven anything,” McGarrigle said of the prosecution’s case. “We are not in a disciplinary hearing. There has to be an intent to do something criminal, and it was his money to do whatever he wanted to do.” he argued that the women had been told what Janis intended to do for them, and at least one seemed satisfied enough that she considered hiring him for new work on her behalf.

The three women involved — Bonnie Hains, Katherine Bailey, and Judith Borland — all testified at the hearing about their interactions with Janis, which took place in 2014 and 2015, before his license was suspended by the state. The suspension came after multiple clients told investigators for the Disciplinary Board that Janis had taken money for their cases and then did little or no work for them, and attempted to skirt their attempts to get refunds.

Hains said that she had paid Janis $2,500 in March 2014 for a custody case involving her daughter, Jami Hains. She said that Janis had initially told her that the “retainer” would be put into a secure account that he would withdrawl from as her worked, but that he later sent her daughter a written fee agreement that specified that the $2,500 was a one-time payment to his office that would be deposited into his operating account rather than a trust account.

Eventually, when Hains checked court dockets in Chester and Montgomery counties, she learned that Janis had never filed anything in her daughter’s behalf, according to a criminal complaint filed in January.

Likewise, Bailey testified that she had paid Janis $2,500 in January 2015 to represent her in a child custody matter. She said he seemed to do little to present her case at a mediation hearing held in the Justice Center in March 2015, and afterwards told her. “He was going to take care of everything.”

But she said she later learned he had never spoken with the attorney for the child’s father, and never sent her an itemized bill for his services. There was a complete lack of communication, and she never received a refund for her payment    after he was suspended.

Finally, Borland said she paid Janis $3,000 to handle her divorce in July 2015, at a time when he was being investigated by the Disciplinary Board. He told her nothing of the investigation, and gave her no written fee agreement. He filed a divorce complaint in her behalf, she said in her testimony, but “not a lot happened after that.”

Eventually, when she saw an article in the Daily Local News about his suspension, she contacted him and received $920 back from him, although he never explained what he had done to earn the $2,080.

McGarrigle objected frequently to much of the women’s testimony, and argued that the alleged thefts might be attributed to sloppy bookkeeping, but lacked any showing of criminal intent. The charges that Janis faces include theft by failure to make required disposition of funds, theft by deception, and receiving stolen property. 

According to a press release from the District Attorney’s Office announcing the latest arrest, the total sum of alleged thefts from former clients is now in excess of $100,000, in addition to the thefts from his mother-in-law.

Said District Attorney Tom Hogan: "The defendant’s pattern of conduct is reprehensible.  He regarded everybody he met as a potential victim - - his clients, his wife, even his mother-in-law.”

The allegations from the criminal complaint are as follows:

 After Janis was arrested for the first time in July and charged with stealing money from the West Chester law firm he worked at from 2006 to 2013, his wife, Jennifer Hulnick, left him and divorced him.  During the subsequent time period, she discovered that he had opened multiple credit card accounts in her name without her permission and incurred substantial debts in her name.

In August, Hulnick went to the mailbox that she and Janis had shared at their former home in East Caln and found a bank statement from JP Morgan Chase identifying $3,931 in an outstanding balance. The account was in the name of Ellen Hulnick, her mother, and the company they ran together.

In their investigation, Davis and Dougherty discovered that the defendant had set up a Chase account in Ellen Hulnick’s name, but with his own contact information and phone number, preventing his mother-in-law from knowing about the account.  He used his mother-in-law’s name, Social Security number, and date of birth to open the account, and incurred $5,000 in unpaid debt on this account, less fees and costs.

Hulnick told the detectives that she had earlier caught Janis trying to open an account in her name in March 2016, just after she and her daughter started their business. When she confronted him, he told her he was “just trying something” and “messing around” without any further explanation, according to the criminal complaint. She told him he did not have any permission to open any account in her name. The new account was opened by Janis that same month, according to the investigators. 

Janis is charged with identity theft, forgery, theft by deception, and receiving stolen property. After arraigning him, Binder set bail at $10,000 unsecured. The three cases that have been held for Common Pleas Court have been assigned to Judge Patrick Carmody.

Anyone with additional information is asked to contact Dougherty at 610-344-6866.

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Legal woes adding up for suspended Chesco lawyer

Special needs trust lawyer faces another theft charge

A suspended Indianapolis attorney who specialized in establishing special needs trusts before he was accused of stealing from those clients is facing felony theft charges in another Indiana county.

Kenneth S. Service, 45, was charged last month with Class D felony theft in Delaware County, where he is accused of stealing $23,622 from a former client, authorities said Thursday.

The charge accuses Service of exerting unauthorized control over the property of an alleged victim between April 30, 2014 and June 18, 2016. The alleged victim had been the subject of a guardianship established in 2003 when she was a minor. Online court records show Service was removed as trustee of the guardianship in December 2016.

Service was suspended from the practice of law in June 2017 for noncooperation with an investigation into a grievance filed against him, and he was suspended indefinitely the following October.

The disciplinary complaints against Service came after he was charged in December 2016 with stealing more than $85,000 from two clients in Lawrence County. Service faces a charge of Level 5 felony theft in that case and has a trial date of Aug. 1 at the courthouse in Bedford.

Service, who court records show is now representing himself in the criminal matter in Lawrence County, could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Authorities said last year they feared Service’s alleged financial crimes could be widespread, with a law enforcement investigator warning of the possibility of “multiple victims in multiple states.”

Service was the founder of Carmel-based National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity Inc., before he was fired from the organization in 2014. Special Needs Integrity was ordered by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in February to repay the estate of a woman more than $234,000 that the organization took from her trust account after she died in 2011.

In that case, National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity, Inc. v. Devon Reese, as Personal Representative for the Estate of Theresa A. Givens, 17-1817, Circuit Judge David Hamilton wrote, “…(W)e must note that the Foundation’s (former) counsel, (Kenneth) Shane Service, testified that he intentionally drafted (a section of Special Needs Integrity’s agreement dealing with distributions upon the death of a beneficiary) to confuse Missouri government officials.”

Service is scheduled to appear for an initial hearing before Delaware Circuit Judge Marianne Vorhees on July 25 at the courthouse in Muncie to face his latest criminal charge.

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Special needs trust lawyer faces another theft charge

7th Circuit reverses, orders special needs trust group to pay estate

The estate of a woman whose special needs trust was drained under questionable circumstances prevailed Wednesday before the 7^th Circuit Court of Appeals. The founder of the organization that took the money is a suspended Indiana attorney facing charges that he stole from other clients’ trusts.  The organization must now repay the estate more than $200,000.

The court reversed Southern District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt and ordered the National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity Inc. to pay the estate of Missouri woman Theresa Givens $234,181.23 plus prejudgment interest.

“We respectfully disagree with our colleague on the district court,” Circuit Judge David Hamilton wrote for the panel in National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity, Inc. v. Devon Reese, as Personal Representative for the Estate of Theresa A. Givens, 17-1817. The 7^th Circuit held that Pratt’s ruling that the estate’s claim against Special Needs Integrity were barred by the doctrine of laches “was based on clearly erroneous findings of fact.”

Further, Hamilton wrote, “We must note that the Foundation’s (former) counsel, (Kenneth) Shane Service, testified that he intentionally drafted (a section of Special Needs Integrity’s agreement dealing with distributions upon the death of a beneficiary) to confuse Missouri government officials.”

Givens had set up a special needs trust with about $255,000 in settlement proceeds from a lawsuit related to injuries she received from dialysis treatments. She died shortly after the trust was established, and her children were told by Special Needs Integrity that there would be no money left in Givens’ account. Hamilton, though, noted in the opinion that Service also had testified that Givens’ “main concern was always about her children.”

While the children received none of the roughly $234,000 that remained in Givens’ trust when she died in 2011, the foundation claimed the money after initially informing Givens’ children there would be no money because the proceeds most likely would be consumed by Medicaid refunds. After the children questioned distributions to the foundation, Special Needs Integrity filed a declaratory judgment action against the estate in April 2015, which Pratt awarded.

But the 7^th Circuit found the contract Givens signed to be ambiguous and found no reason to believe Givens intended her money to go to the foundation rather than to her children. “The Foundation provided Givens with a service by managing her assets for what turned out to be just a few weeks before she died — a service for which Givens paid the Foundation” Hamilton wrote. “There is no plausible reason she would have intended to give it all the money that might be left upon her death.

“… We thus conclude that the agreement is best construed as providing that the remainder funds go to the Estate of Theresa Givens,” the panel held in reversing and ordering the foundation to pay the estate $234,181.23 plus prejudgment interest.

During oral arguments in September, Lewis & Kappes attorney David Gray, who represented Special Needs Integrity, faced tough questioning from Hamilton.

“You don’t even have records of a decision” by Service or by other foundation representatives to take the money, Hamilton said. “You just have money shifted from one account to another in 2013 and then again in 2014.

“… Why should we simply not decide it’s an ambiguous document that needs to be construed against the drafter and order distribution?” he asked Gray near the end of his presentation.

“If laches doesn’t work, nothing prevents you from doing it,” Gray responded.

Meanwhile, Service is awaiting trial on theft charges in Lawrence County, where he is accused of stealing more than $85,000 from two former clients’ special needs trusts.  Authorities believe Service may have other victims in different states. An Indiana State Police investigator said in September officials were looking into the possibility of “numerous victims in multiple states.”

Service’s next court date on the Lawrence County charges is set for March 21.

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7th Circuit reverses, orders special needs trust group to pay estate

Suspended special needs trust attorney, foundation’s legal woes continue

A suspended Indianapolis attorney charged with stealing from his clients’ special needs trusts remained at the center of a case argued Wednesday before the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. Kenneth Shane Service crafted trust documents now in dispute that he has said he intended to be confusing, argued attorneys in a case involving the nonprofit foundation Service established.

Service personally established the special needs trust for Theresa A. Givens, a Missouri woman who died in 2011. Shortly before she died, she had funded her trust with roughly $250,000 she received from settling a lawsuit over a harmful medical procedure she experienced related to her dialysis treatment. After her death, almost all the money remained in her estate.

But her children have received none of it. Instead, the remainder — at least $220,000 — went to the National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity Inc., the Carmel-based nonprofit Service established that administered Givens’ special needs trust along with others nationwide, according to court records. The reason: Givens had provided her own name on trust documents where she was to designate trust beneficiaries.

After Givens’ death, when her children began asking for the money, they were told by Special Needs Integrity that Medicaid would have first claim on the trust to repay any expenses provided for her care, according to the record. But there is no evidence they were ever informed that Medicaid had no claims for health care provided to Givens, attorneys for both the estate and Special Needs Integrity told the 7th Circuit.

In 2015, Special Needs Integrity sued Givens’ estate. It sought a declaratory judgment that it was entitled to the money it took from Givens’ trust in 2013 and 2014 pursuant to a joinder agreement she signed. That agreement said that if no beneficiary is designated, the remainder of her trust would be distributed among the pooled national trust that the foundation manages. Givens’ estate countersued.

Before Service was charged in a separate case with felony theft from Indiana special needs trusts and suspended from the practice of law this summer, a federal judge ruled for Special Needs Integrity on a doctrine of laches basis in Givens’ case. While her heirs had asked for the money earlier, “the Estate waited more than three and a half years after Givens’ death to take legal action, the Estate was aware of the existing conditions, and National Foundation would be prejudiced by the Estate’s unreasonable delay,” Judge Tanya Walton Pratt in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana wrote in her decision.

Judge David Hamilton seemed perplexed at times during oral arguments Wednesday, hearing the estate’s appeal of Pratt’s ruling in National Foundation for Special Needs Integrity v. Devon Reese, 17-1817.

Lewis & Kappes P.C. attorney David Gray argued for the foundation that the fact heirs were never told there was no Medicaid claim was a red herring, which drew a retort from Hamilton.

“It’s not a red herring given the confusing nature of the document that the district judge treated as unambiguous so as to reach this very odd result,” Hamilton said. He suggested the agreement was ambiguous and therefore should be construed against the drafter, and he appeared dubious that the underlying facts of the case could support a laches judgment.

“Mr. Service testified, and it’s also within the testimony under summary judgment that the trust was intentionally created to be confusing,” St. Louis attorney James Beckemeier argued to the panel on behalf of the estate.

Beckemeier argued there were multiple errors in Pratt’s ruling and urged the court to award the remainder of Givens’ trust to the estate. He said there is no evidence in the record to suggest she wanted the trust to get her money, but ample evidence that she wanted her children to, a presumption in Indiana law that he said the court “completely disregarded.”

Referencing Givens’ designation of herself as a beneficiary, he said, “Where there is a mistake that creates an absurdity, rescission is appropriate.”

Beckemeier argued the foundation spent Givens’ trust money on “completely illicit and inappropriate things such as lavish hotels, lavish restaurants, and the court apparently disregarded that.”

Gray, however, argued that the foundation told heirs weeks after they inquired that they wouldn’t receive any money. “They were told three and a half years before they were not going to get the money. The money was gone a year beforehand,” he said.

But Hamilton interjected that this was only half the story. He suggested the family may have been left with the impression there could be a later distribution. Trust officials, he said, “never said Medicaid has no claim, but we’re keeping the money.

“You don’t even have records of a decision” by Service or by other foundation representatives to take the money, Hamilton said. “You just have money shifted from one account to another in 2013 and then again in 2014.

“… Why should we simply not decide it’s an ambiguous document that needs to be construed against the drafter and order distribution?” he asked Gray near the end of his presentation.

“If laches doesn’t work, nothing prevents you from doing it,” Gray responded.

While the Givens matter is pending, it’s just one of many legal entanglements for Service and the foundation.

In June, Special Needs Integrity confidentially settled a class-action lawsuit in Marion County that alleged, among other things, that the nonprofit overcharged clients and collected unauthorized fees from trust accounts.

Service founded the nonprofit in 2007, and for years it grew progressively in revenue collected largely from fees assessed on trust funds. Tax records for the organization in the years since show Special Needs Integrity compensated Service in some years with more than one-quarter of total revenue and spent aggressively on legal fees and management costs. For example, records for the following tax years show:

• In 2010 and prior years, Service reported no compensation, but the organization paid up to 42 percent of revenue in some years to Special Needs Trust Consultants LLC — a Carmel-based entity registered by Service.  
• In 2011, Service took no salary. The nonprofit collected $593,424 in revenue, but costs under the management category were $289,769, compared with staff wages of $104,477.
• In 2013, Service took a salary of almost $238,000 on revenue of almost $936,000. In addition to other salaries of more than $451,000, the nonprofit also reported management costs of more than $134,000, legal expenses of nearly $124,000, and almost $66,000 spent on conferences, conventions and meetings.
• In 2014, the nonprofit collected $1.12 million, and Service was paid $170,525. Management costs rose to more than $476,000, and legal fees were listed at more than $76,000.

In 2014, the foundation booted Service and sued him, after which Service countersued. That suit remains pending in HamiltonSuperior Court, though a hearing is set Oct. 13 to dismiss Service’s countersuit for lack of prosecution.

Meanwhile, Service remains charged in Lawrence County with two counts of Level 5 felony theft. He is accused of stealing more than $85,522 from two special-needs trust clients there, and authorities and attorneys who have removed Service as a trustee in several cases around Indiana fear there could be more potential victims here and in other states.

Near the end of Wednesday’s oral argument, Hamilton asked Beckemeier what Service’s legal status was. Beckemeier said this wasn’t in the court record, but Hamilton granted leave to take notice of the public record. “I believe he’s under state indictment, if not federal,” Beckemeier said.

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Suspended special needs trust attorney, foundation’s legal woes continue

Authorities consider criminal investigation of suspended Las Vegas attorney

Robert Graham

By JEFF GERMAN
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL

Law enforcement authorities are discussing whether to investigate allegations that suspended probate lawyer Robert Graham stole millions of dollars from clients before abruptly abandoning his law practice, District Attorney Steve Wolfson said Monday.

“I personally spoke with the sheriff today, and I can tell you that both his agency in collaboration with my office are on it,” Wolfson said. “We are in the beginning stages of determining whether a criminal investigation is warranted.”

Undersheriff Kevin McMahill said the FBI and Nevada attorney general’s office also are involved in the discussions.

“We’re going through the process of determining who has the appropriate jurisdiction for the investigation and prosecution,” McMahill said. “We have to determine what crimes have been committed.”

Las Vegas police conducted some interviews last week.

Attorney Michael Kling, who represents a former Graham client owed more than $1 million in an estate case, confirmed Monday that he and the potential victim spoke with detectives last week about Graham’s failure to turn over the money despite a court order.

Joseph Kistler, another lawyer working to recoup $1 million for the estate of Michael Macknin, obtained a court order on Friday to freeze eight financial accounts in which Graham and his Lawyers West law firm held client funds.

The order, signed by District Judge Gloria Sturman, prohibits both Graham and his wife Linda Graham, who is also an attorney, from disbursing funds in the accounts.

Kistler said Monday that he also was interviewed by police last week.

In court papers, Kistler alleged that Graham last month circulated a phony bank statement purporting to show that he had enough money in a trust account to cover the $1 million payment to the Macknin estate.

But Graham ignored a Nov. 17 order by Sturman to hand over the money, court documents show.

Kistler also said in his papers that he was concerned that Linda Graham may have access to the assets of her husband’s clients and “may be working in concert with Graham and against the interests of Mr. Graham’s clients.”

The State Bar of Nevada alleged in a complaint last week that her husband stole millions of dollars in client funds before closing Lawyers West on Dec. 2, leaving employees without jobs and abandoning client files in a rented Summerlin office. The firm, which was about to be evicted, also had offices in Utah and Colorado.

An initial bar analysis of Graham’s bank records shows that his law practice should be holding more than $13 million in funds for clients. But the balances in his accounts are “much less” than that, Assistant Bar Counsel Janeen Isaacson wrote in the complaint last week.

In court documents obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Isaacson said the $13 million figure is likely to grow because the bar has examined only about half of Graham’s more than 100 cases.

Attorneys Jasen and Brandi Cassady, who were appointed to take over Graham’s cases, set up a GoFundMe web page over the weekend to raise money nationwide for Graham’s former clients.

Jasen Cassady said on the website that less than $200,000 remains in Graham’s client trust account, but Isaacson disclosed in her complaint that Graham kept an undisclosed amount of client money in other banking and investment accounts.

The Nevada Supreme Court on Friday temporarily suspended Graham’s license while the state bar conducts disciplinary proceedings.

The bar complaint alleges that Graham, who has been practicing law in Nevada since 1992, “misappropriated millions of dollars from his current and former trust, probate and estate clients.”

Graham had “routinely and consistently” failed to distribute funds being held for clients and lied to them about the status of their funds, the complaint alleges.

The firm’s financial failings surfaced in September when American Express Bank filed a lawsuit against Graham seeking to recover more than $150,000 in unpaid charges to his “business platinum card.” The charges stemmed from a June 6 statement.

Attorney P. Sterling Kerr, who is representing Graham in the state bar proceedings, said over the weekend that Graham is in Las Vegas and poses no flight risk.

Efforts to reach Graham and his wife have been unsuccessful.

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Authorities consider criminal investigation of suspended Las Vegas attorney

Suspended lawyer accused of lying at state bar hearing

By Jeff German
Las Vegas Review-Journal

 

Suspended defense lawyer Brian Bloomfield lied under oath before a state bar panel considering action against him over his forgery guilty plea, a prosecutor charged in court Wednesday.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Marc DiGiacomo also accused Bloomfield of trying to disrupt the forgery investigation of another lawyer, Vicki Greco, who was indicted by a county grand jury in December on 139 felony and gross misdemeanor counts.

Both lawyers were involved in a courthouse scheme to provide clients, mostly prostitutes, with phony certificates of completion for court-ordered counseling and community service to resolve misdemeanor cases, prosecutors have alleged.

DiGiacomo leveled the latest allegations against Bloomfield while seeking prison time for Bloomfield during his sentencing before District Judge Jessie Walsh. The judge wanted time to review the transcript of the bar hearing and reset the sentencing to March 7.

"All lawyers are distrusted because of the actions of Mr. Bloomfield," DiGiacomo said. "He harmed the community."

DiGiacomo's allegations validated claims made by Bloomfield's estranged wife and co-defendant, Amber Bloomfield, in a December Las Vegas Review-Journal story.

His wife, who is locked in a bitter child custody battle with Bloomfield, sat in court Wednesday away from his family. She pleaded guilty and got no prison time because of her cooperation with prosecutors.

DiGiacomo said Bloomfield lied when he told the State Bar of Nevada panel in June that he didn't personally participate in the destruction of files at his office in April 2010.

His words contradicted what he admitted to authorities in November 2013 before he pleaded guilty to felony forgery charges, DiGiacomo argued.

"There is nothing credible about anything he's ever said to us," DiGiacomo told Walsh. "We can't tell when he's telling the truth."

DiGiacomo said Bloomfield even originally lied to authorities about his knowledge of Greco's alleged involvement in the courthouse counseling scheme.

Following an August meeting with police and prosecutors in which they questioned Bloomfield about Greco's role in the scheme, Bloomfield made a clandestine, late-night visit to the home of Greco's accountant and tipped her off to the investigation, DiGiacomo said.

Prosecutors believe the courthouse scheme started with Greco in 2008, DiGiacomo said.

Bloomfield's errant actions since pleading guilty show he doesn't understand the seriousness of the harm he has caused to the justice system, DiGiacomo argued.

Defense lawyer William Terry did not get a chance to respond to DiGiacomo's allegations in court, but he will have an opportunity when the sentencing resumes in March.

Terry declined to comment afterward. He previously has said he did not believe Bloomfield lied at the bar hearing.

Bloomfield, whose license was temporarily suspended after his guilty plea, is waiting to hear whether the Nevada Supreme Court will accept a five-year suspension recommended by the disciplinary panel in the forgery case or impose a tougher punishment.

State bar prosecutors want Bloomfield permanently disbarred.

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Suspended lawyer accused of lying at state bar hearing

Suspended lawyer faces new allegations of misconduct from wife

Brian Bloomfield

By Jeff German
Las Vegas Review-Journal

 

Embattled Las Vegas lawyer Brian Bloomfield, whose law license is suspended in the wake of a felony conviction, is facing new allegations of misconduct from a new source — his estranged wife.

Bloomfield, 40, is facing a five-year suspension over his December 2013 guilty plea to felony and gross misdemeanor charges in a scheme that provided Las Vegas Justice Court with phony certificates of completion on behalf of clients ordered to undergo counseling and perform community service.

He and his wife, Amber Bloomfield, 32, are now locked in bitter divorce and child custody proceedings. Issues she has raised could affect an upcoming decision by the Nevada Supreme Court on his fitness to practice law. The high court has the option of a stiffer penalty, including disbarment.

In an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Amber alleges her husband:

-- Lied under oath to the disciplinary panel of the State Bar of Nevada that recommended the suspension following a day of testimony in which Bloomfield expressed remorse. The Bar's chief prosecutor had sought disbarment at the June hearing.

-- Forced her to marry him after he was indicted for forging court documents so she could assert the marital privilege and not have to testify against him. They were married in January 2012, a month after Bloomfield's indictment.

-- Tipped the accountant for lawyer Vicki Greco to a police investigation of the lawyer. Greco was indicted last week on 138 felony and gross misdemeanor charges, including forging court documents and destroying evidence.

Bloomfield's attorney, William Terry, rebutted Amber Bloomfield's claims and said he doesn't think his client lied at the disciplinary hearing.

State Bar Counsel Stan Hunterton declined comment.

In their now-sealed divorce case, the Bloomfields have exchanged a slew of inflammatory allegations as they fight for custody of their three young children. Each accuses the other of mental instability and of displaying personal behavior detrimental to the children.

Amber Bloomfield acknowledged in the interview that she overdosed on prescription drugs in a failed suicide attempt during the criminal investigation of her husband. She said she tried to take her own life because of her husband's repeated infidelity.

Brian Bloomfield told the State Bar disciplinary panel that he has undergone psychological counseling and is on prescription medication for depression and anxiety. At the hearing he portrayed himself as an emotional wreck.

Family Court Judge Linda Marquis, a longtime Terry associate prior to the criminal investigation of Bloomfield, is overseeing the divorce case. She has disclosed her former relationship with Terry in court.

Both Bloomfields were targeted in the Las Vegas police investigation. Amber was charged under her maiden name, McDearmon, and later pleaded guilty to a gross misdemeanor charge of destroying evidence. Her sentence was for time served — the day she spent in jail following her 2012 arrest.

Brian Bloomfield in his guilty plea admitted that he filed or helped file forged court records in 91 cases that falsely claimed his clients, mostly prostitutes, had completed the counseling or community service. He also admitted having office files destroyed to cover his actions. He is waiting to be sentenced.

At his disciplinary hearing in June, Bloomfield sobbed repeatedly, begging a five-member panel to let him keep his law license.

He denied personally destroying key client files in the courthouse fraud and said he once sat in a closet in his house with a handgun contemplating suicide.

His wife says that's not true.

"It's a lie that he didn't destroy any client files," Amber Bloomfield said. "I went to his office with him. He was pulling papers out and throwing them in a pile. They were files the police didn't know about."

At the hearing, Bloomfield testified that he asked his legal runner at the time, Brandon Snowden, to "get rid" of a stack of documents police left on his desk during a raid on April 27, 2010.

But Snowden, who is a felon, testified before the grand jury that he helped shred client file documents and left the office with three bags of shredded papers.

Instead of throwing the bags in the trash, Snowden gave them to police, leading to more charges against Bloomfield. A police forensic specialist spent 10 weeks reassembling the documents.

Terry said Bloomfield was candid about having documents destroyed and believed none of the papers were relevant to the investigation. But in hindsight, Terry said, his client shouldn't have destroyed anything.

"There was at least a reason to believe that the police, as a result of their investigation, would be interested in additional files, and that's where the problem was," he said.

Bloomfield's testimony about suicidal thoughts?

"Complete lie," Amber said.

Bloomfield hasn't owned a gun since police seized one of his along with a bag of marijuana in the 2010 raid and another was later stolen, she said.

"He's in love with himself," Amber added. "The last thing he would do is take his own life."
Terry said he believes his client.

"I can tell you he was going through depression," Terry said. "He had an immense amount of stress in the newspaper. I wasn't in the closet with him, but I believe he contemplated suicide."

Despite their differences, Amber said, she always wanted to marry Bloomfield, but it didn't happen as she envisioned.

One morning several weeks after Bloomfield's indictment, she explained, he woke her and said he wanted to get married that day.

"He told me that I had to marry him," she said. "He didn't want to take the chance of the police forcing me to testify against him."

With that, they rushed to a downtown wedding chapel.

"To my knowledge no one forced anyone to marry anyone to assert a husband-wife privilege,'' Terry countered. "That wouldn't have protected him. Only communication is privileged, not an act such as destroying files."

Amber said she suspects her husband recently tried to influence the criminal case against Vicki Greco, his friend.

After police interviewed Bloomfield about the forgery allegations surrounding Greco, he went to see Greco's accountant, Amber said.

Bloomfield said he thought the accountant, who also handled the couple's taxes, might be raided by police and wanted to warn her about it, according to his wife.

Greco's indictment describes Bloomfield meeting her in 2010 and 2011 to discuss ways to hide evidence from police.

Terry wouldn't comment on anything to do with the Greco case because the investigation is ongoing.

Amber said her husband also wasn't honest at the disciplinary hearing about his current earnings. He testified that he is paid $9 per hour in a telemarketing call room but did not reveal thousands of dollars in commissions, she said.

Terry said Bloomfield isn't making a lot of money on commissions and has needed financial help from his parents.

According to Amber, her husband and some of his friends who testified at the hearing ruined her reputation by trying to blame his legal and professional troubles on her. She said she was falsely accused of being a drug addict and a "crazy, horrible person."

Terry said he was surprised when testimony about Bloomfield's wife surfaced at the hearing and he did not intend for that to happen.

As for Bloomfield's expression of remorse, Amber said she wasn't impressed.

"It's the biggest (B.S.) ever," she said. "He still refuses to take responsibility for what he did."

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Suspended lawyer faces new allegations of misconduct from wife