Professor Andrew Kent discusses scenarios for reinstatement for attorneys disbarred for misappropriation in the New Jersey Law Journal.
Typically lawyers in other states who have misappropriated funds are allowed to resume practicing if they retake the bar exam or attend continuing legal education classes, Kent said. But he’d like to see such lawyers held to provisions such as mandatory disclosures to clients about past misappropriation and periodic audits of attorney trust accounts.
And if the misconduct was related to age-related cognitive issues, mental illness or substance abuse, Kent said, he wants to see those issues addressed before the lawyer is reinstated.
“There are also some people out there who probably shouldn’t be lawyers, who don’t have the proper ethical framework to begin with” Kent said. “Given human nature, there has to be some percentage of people who would fall into that group.”