Retired attorney faces 9-month suspension

Listen to this article

A retired Madison-area attorney faces a nine-month suspension over allegations that he mishandled thousands of dollars of his clients’ money.

An Office of Lawyer Regulation complaint filed July 3 charged Michael Erhard with 11 counts of misconduct stemming from misdeeds he is alleged to have committed from March 2014 to July 2015, during his time as a member and owner of the Madison-based Erhard & Payette.

The OLR alleges that, among other things, Erhard failed to hold thousands of dollars of his clients’ money in the firm’s trust account, made prohibited electronic transfers of client money from the firm trust account to the firm’s operating account and made more than $68,000 in prohibited cash withdrawals from the firm’s trust account.
The OLR is asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to suspend Erhard’s license for nine months.

Erhard, reached Friday, said he has been discussing the matter with the OLR for about a year and was surprised the agency had decided to file the complaint.

He said does not dispute that the violations happened but he believes they should warrant only a private reprimand.

“To be honest, I did not know the existence of these rules,” he said. “Shame on me. I was so busy. Administrating a small firm when you have several associates and a small number of staff and you’re the man is no small task. It’s not an excuse, but it is an explanation.”

At its peak, his firm at the time, Erhard & Payette, later Erhard Law Group, had seven full-time attorneys, two part-time attorneys and at most two student law clerks. Erhard was the managing member and closed the firm in late 2015. He used to work on complex civil-litigation cases.

Erhard noted that some of the violations involve a $82,000 shortfall he discovered after switching accounting firms and before the OLR looked into the matter. It turned out that he had overpaid a client. Days after the discovery, he used his own money to provide a remedy.

“At the end of the day, I’m the one who paid,” he said. “I’m the one who made the mistake. I paid the $82,000. I’m basically retired. I’m of counsel.”

Erhard, who is now of counsel at Middleton-based Fuhrman & Dodge, said he will be hiring a lawyer to represent him in the matter.

He said the first thing he hopes to do is meet early on, as suggested by the OLR’s counsel in the matter.

“Hopefully we can resolve it quickly,” said Erhard. “This is not the kind of thing I believe will be litigated.”

Erhard, who graduated from the University of Cincinnati College of Law in 1973, works in complex civil litigation. He was admitted to practice in Wisconsin in 1973, and his license is active and in good standing, according to the OLR and State Bar websites.

He was last disciplined in 2002, when the high court privately reprimanded him for misconduct including failing to tell a client when a case was dismissed and making misrepresentations in a complaint filed for that client. Follow @erikastrebel