Cohen v. Statewide Grievance Committee

Citations

• 339 Conn. 503

Syllabus

The plaintiff attorney appealed to the trial court, challenging the reprimand imposed on her by the defendant, the Statewide Grievance Committee, for having violated rules 3.3 (a) (1) and 8.4 (3) of the Rules of Professional Conduct. The plaintiff, who was a court-appointed trustee of an estate, had filed an amended final accounting with the Probate Court that sought fiduciary fees for her work after she previously had represented to that court that she would waive the fees and remove them from the final accounting. The defendant upheld the determination of its reviewing committee that the amended final accounting constituted a knowingly false statement in violation of rule 3.3 (a) (1) and that the false statement also was dishonest in violation of rule 8.4 (3). The trial court dismissed the plaintiff's appeal, concluding, inter alia, that the reviewing committee's decision was not clearly erroneous and that the record supported the reviewing committee's findings of fact. The plaintiff thereafter appealed to the Appellate Court, claiming that the trial court improperly expanded the application of rule 3.3 to include attorneys functioning in a fiduciary role and improperly upheld the reviewing committee's determinations that she violated rules 3.3 (a) (1) and 8.4 504 NOVEMBER, 2021 339 Conn. 503 Cohen v. Statewide Grievance Committee (3). The Appellate Court affirmed the trial court's judgment, and the plaintiff, on the granting of certification, appealed to this court. Held: 1. The plaintiff could not prevail on her claim that rule 3.3 (a) (1) did not apply to her because the Probate Court had appointed her to act as a fiduciary for an estate and the commentary to that rule indicates that it governs the conduct of a lawyer representing a client in the proceed- ings of a tribunal: although the commentary illustrates the most common context in which the rule would apply, that is, lawyers appearing before a tribunal in the course of client representation, there are man