Bankruptcy court to attorney: Pay OLR

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A federal bankruptcy court has decided not to let a LaCrosse man discharge costs imposed on him by the Wisconsin Supreme Court when it suspended his law license for harassing his ex-girlfriend.

The Supreme Court in January 2014 suspended Randy Netzer’s license for 90 days for his conviction in April 2011 of two counts of violating a harassment injunction. The disciplinary action stemmed from him taking out two ads that were intended for his former girlfriend in the La Crosse Tribune newspaper.

The justices also ordered him to get a mental health evaluation and to pay $9,222.21 for the cost of the disciplinary proceeding. His license, according to the State Bar and Office of Lawyer Regulation websites, remains suspended.

Netzer filed for bankruptcy in August 2014 and, in December of the same year, received a general discharge of his debts from the U.S Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Wisconsin. However, after the bankruptcy case was closed in January, the OLR contacted Netzer about the costs from the disciplinary case, telling Netzer that the debt was still owed.

Netzer, however, according to the Feb. 3 decision, said the costs had been discharged. He reopened the bankruptcy, asking the court to declare the costs in the disciplinary case to have been discharged and to order that no third party, including the state Department of Administration, could collect the amount.

However, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Catherine Furay, in a memorandum decision Feb. 3, denied his request, finding that the money owed to the OLR could not be wiped away.

Furay found that under federal law, the OLR is a government unit and that the money covered more than just reimbursing the OLR for costs it had incurred — it was also imposed as punishment. For that reason, she concluded that the costs owed could not be discharged in bankruptcy proceedings.

Doing so, Furay reasoned, would impede the OLR’s ability to carry out its duties as laid out by the Supreme Court. Follow @erikastrebel