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Attorney Grievance Commission v. Brown3/11/1999
Bar Counsel filed two Petitions for Disciplinary Action on behalf of petitioner, Attorney Grievance Commission, against Erroll Donnelly Brown, respondent, pursuant to Maryland Rule 16-709. Both petitions were consolidated for review before the Court of Appeals. The first petition (Misc. Docket AG No. 2) alleges numerous violations of the Maryland Rules of Professional Conduct based on three separate complaints filed against respondent. The second petition (Misc. Docket AG No. 34) seeks a "reciprocal" sanction for respondent's suspension for thirty days from the practice of law in the District of Columbia. We referred both petitions to circuit court judges for findings of fact and proposed conclusions of law. They were ultimately heard by Judge James J. Lombardi. In the first petition, Judge Lombardi found clear and convincing evidence of all counts presented by petitioner. In the second petition, he found clear and convincing evidence of all but one count. We sustain the findings of fact. We accept most of the court's proposed conclusions of law as modified, infra. We shall suspend respondent indefinitely, with permission to apply for readmission after one year.
I. Background
Petitioner filed the first petition on March 12, 1998. The matter was referred to Judge Arthur M. Monty Ahalt who conducted a fact-finding hearing regarding this petition on June 1, 1998, and filed his findings of fact and proposed conclusions of law on June 30, 1998. Respondent excepted to those findings and moved for a remand for new proceedings because he was absent from the hearing. We granted respondent's motion on July 28, 1998.
Petitioner filed the second petition on July 22, 1998. The two petitions subsequently were consolidated and both cases argued together on October 1, 1998, before Judge Lombardi of the Circuit Court for Prince George's County. Judge Lombardi made the following findings with respect to the first petition (Misc. Docket AG No. 2):
"1. Wanda Johnson, Esq. of the District of Columbia Bar, Kirk Wilder, Esq. of the Virginia Bar, and Erroll Donnelly Brown, Esq. of the Maryland Bar represented Tammie Davis in a lawsuit brought in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia alleging inter alia racial and gender discrimination in the work place. Davis v. P.R.C., Incorporated, Civil Action No. 94-938-A. At the end of discovery the defendant's motion for summary judgment was granted. "2. At that time Ms. Johnson, Mr. Wilder, and Mr. Brown were each sanctioned by the Court at the request of the defendants, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1988, 42 U.S.C. 1981 (a) and Rule 11 of the Fed. Rules Civ. Proc. for "re-filing and pursuing a race discrimination complaint that had no evidentiary basis." "3. Mr. Brown paid $14,000, which was his share of the sanctions imposed by the federal court. "4. Mr. Brown failed to respond to Bar Counsel's request for information concerning the matter set forth above. "5. Erroll Donnelly Brown represented Rhonda Jones in a dispute with Johns Hopkins Hospital over the termination of her employment at the hospital. In that regard he pursued two separate courses of action for Ms. Jones. One was a complaint for declaratory judgment in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, Jones v. Johns Hopkins Hospital et al, Civil Action No. CE190143, seeking representation of counsel at the termination hearing at the hospital (so as to contest the reasons for the firing). The second was an effort to convince the Maryland Department of Economic and Employment Development ("MDEED") to amend the reasons for Ms. Jones' firing from "gross misconduct" to "misconduct," (so as to contest the reasons for her firing and to reduce the economic impact of her terminat
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