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Editorial: Supreme Court sends clear message on lawyers' misconduct

 
In stripping two Tampa attorneys of their licenses, the Florida Supreme Court sent a strong message about the sanctity of the judicial process.
In stripping two Tampa attorneys of their licenses, the Florida Supreme Court sent a strong message about the sanctity of the judicial process.
Published Aug. 25, 2016

The Florida Supreme Court appropriately resolved one of the most sordid chapters in the state's legal history Thursday by disbarring two Tampa attorneys who set up a rival lawyer in a staged drunken-driving arrest. By stripping Robert Adams and Adam Filthaut of their licenses to practice law, the court sent a strong message to practicing attorneys and the Florida Bar about the sanctity of the judicial process, and it helped restore public confidence in the courts.

The Supreme Court's order came nearly one year after Pinellas Senior Judge W. Douglas Baird recommended that Adams, Filthaut and their law partner, Stephen Diaco, be disbarred for conspiring to arrange the 2013 arrest of Tampa lawyer C. Philip Campbell. The judge found the three acted to gain advantage in a defamation lawsuit pitting their client, radio personality Bubba the Love Sponge Clem, against his on-air rival, Todd "MJ" Schnitt, whom Campbell represented.

Baird's trial ruling affirmed the blistering report by the state's special prosecutor. Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney Bernie McCabe found that a paralegal for the Adams & Diaco firm had spotted Campbell in a downtown Tampa bar, lied about where she worked, and drank and flirted with him — all while texting her bosses. They, in turn, induced a "close, personal friend" who headed the Tampa Police Department's drunken-driving squad to stake out the bar and pull Campbell over as he moved the paralegal's car.

In its unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court said the misconduct was "among the most shocking, unethical and unprofessional" it had ever seen. Turning away from Diaco, whom the court disbarred in January, the justices faulted Adams and Filthaut for participating "in a scheme to improperly cause the arrest of opposing counsel." What's more, the court found, the arrest had its effect — disrupting the trial and creating a public furor. The court considered and then dismissed lighter punishment, calling the misconduct in this case "unique and essentially unprecedented."

The court got it right. So did Baird, who fairly handled the disciplinary trial and presented a clear recommendation to the court. But the right outcome would not have happened had this case been left to the Florida Bar, the profession's policing arm, which initially offered a ridiculously light plea deal, then prosecuted the case haltingly in court. The ruling should be a wake-up call to the Bar to strengthen its oversight of attorney discipline. It should not fall entirely to the judicial branch to insist on appropriate discipline of attorneys unfit to practice law.

However outrageous the story, it is incredible these events ever made the light of day. That's one reason the court's ruling is so important. "We can only hope that our unanimous decision," the justices noted, "will serve to warn other attorneys of the high standards of professional conduct we demand of all attorneys." The justices continued: "We hope in some small way it will send a message to the public that this court will not tolerate such outrageous misconduct."

That message also ought to be heard by the Florida Bar. This was a painful, needless and self-destructive episode that the courts rightly saw as a larger threat to public confidence in the legal system and responded in the only way that was appropriate.