Legal News

Lawyers Behaving Badly: The Strange Story of John J.P. Howley

By Ashby Jones

It’s a pattern that seems to hit a lot of highly successful people: they manage one area of their lives with exacting scrutiny, while showing extreme carelessness in another. Bill Clinton comes to mind. As does, but of course, Tiger Woods.

The story of lawyer John J.P. Howley, while much less newsworthy than that of LewinskyGate or TigerGate, is in some ways no less confounding. Howley, a former partner at Kaye Scholer and head of the firm’s pro bono practice, was suspended last week for six months by New YOrk’s Appellate Division, 1st Department, for failure to file or pay personal income taxes for more than 10 years. Howley pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor count and was sentenced to pay a $10,000 fine. Click here for the New York Law Journal story, here for the panel’s opinion.

The head of a BigLaw pro bono department failing to pay income taxes for 10 years? Huh? How, exactly, does that happen? Wrote the panel, in a sort of explanation:

Witnesses testified that respondent devoted thousands of hours to pro bono activities on behalf of his firm representing death row defendants and, as a Trustee, gave a great deal of time to and made substantial financial contributions to Skidmore College, his alma mater. Respondent also submitted a letter from a psychiatrist stating that respondent suffered from “an Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder”, that caused him to attend to his work compulsively, but caused him to be careless about various personal matters, including those relating to health and finances.

Nevertheless, the panel found that the aggravating factors in Howley’s case to be “vastly more compelling” than the mitigators and raised the suspension period to a full year.

Howley’s lawyer, Ronald A. Russo of Schlam, Stone & Dolan, told the NYLJ that he was “saddened by the year-long suspension,” especially in view of Howley’s extensive pro bono work for death row inmates while at Kaye Scholer.

The panel in Howley’s case credited his death penalty work but noted that Howley had disregarded his tax obligations while “enjoying a lavish life style.” Specifically, the panel cited his purchase of a five-bedroom house in New Jersey and a four-bedroom house in Florida, as well as three luxury automobiles, including a BMW sports utility vehicle.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on December 22, 2009 (boomark / email).