High court suspends Milwaukee bankruptcy attorney’s license

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court has suspended a Milwaukee attorney’s license for 60 days over how he handled his clients’ bankruptcy cases.

Wednesday’s discipline stems from a July 13 Office of Lawyer Regulation complaint alleging Paul Strouse, a bankruptcy attorney, had mishandled four bankruptcy cases between 2008 and 2010. The OLR requested that the Strouse’s license be suspended for 60 days for eight counts of misconduct.

The allegations in the complaint allege that he didn’t properly informed two clients about the fees owed to him and that he did not respond to requests for information from two other clients. He also lost a piece of fuel monitoring equipment a client gave him, according to the complaint.

Strouse disputed the misconduct identified in two of the bankruptcy cases the OLR identified, but the justices only threw out the charge that accused Strause of fraud, deceit or misrepresentation for going back on an alleged agreement to provide legal services to a client in exchange for website design services.

The court-appointed referee never determined the details of the agreement between Strause and that client, so the justices dismissed the charge.

“This court will not make a finding that the referee could have made but did not,” according to Wednesday’s decision.

Strouse could not immediately be reached Thursday.

The court also ordered Strouse to pay $67,562.12 for the full cost of the proceeding.

Strouse has been licensed to practice law since 1991. He was publicly reprimanded in 2010 and 2011 for misconduct in some bankruptcy cases, including creating a false bankruptcy discharge order and failing to keep clients informed about their cases. He was also publicly reprimanded in May for appearing in court while his license had been suspended for failing to complete continuing education requirements.

According to court filings, Strouse has had years of money problems and disputes go before the court. Notably, he was ordered in 2011 to pay thousands to WCGV-TV, which operates My 24 Milwaukee, for failing to honor a commercial contract in 2009. Follow @erikastrebel