Mequon attorney faces 60-day suspension

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A Mequon employment attorney faces a 60-day suspension over six charges of alleged misconduct.

According to an OLR complaint filed Dec. 15, Janet Heins is suspected of breaking several rules of attorney conduct while representing three clients.

The first two charges of misconduct stem from a client’s hiring of Heins in 2012. The client believed that he had been fired in retaliation for reporting that racially inappropriate remarks that had been made to him, according to the complaint.

In hiring Heins, the client entered into a fee agreement in which he would pay $25,000 in advanced fees that would be deposited into Heins’ business account. The agreement had a provision stipulating that if he disputed any refund, he would have to do so in binding arbitration with the State Bar of Wisconsin’s Fee Arbitration program. He later paid Heins another $3,000 in advanced fees.

The OLR alleges Heins did not provide the client with the sorts of notices that are required when money is deposited into a business account.

Two years later, Heins ended her representation of the client, citing health troubles. She sent him a final bill suggesting he would receive a $1,100 refund, according to the OLR. The client first asked for a “significant refund” and later disputed charges related to extensions that Heins, just before she ended her representation of the client, had asked the court to grant.

The client sought to have his dispute with Heins arbitrated by the State Bar’s program. However, according to the OLR, Heins has refused to go along with that plan.

Separately, the OLR is alleging that Heins failed to hold a different client’s settlement money in her trust account, took too long to disburse it to the client and failed to respond to the OLR’s requests for information related to a grievance that client had filed. One check issued to the client bounced twice. What’s more, in a mere two months after the settlement had been received, the account’s balances had fallen below the amount owed to the client, according to the OLR.

The complaint also alleges that Heins had failed to hold in her trust account $600 from another client’s settlement. According to the OLR, the check was returned because there was no money in the account. Heins issued a check after making deposits to the trust account next day.

Heins, reached Wednesday, declined to comment on the complaint.

The OLR is asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to suspend Heins’ license for 60 days. As conditions of reinstatement, the agency is asking the court to require that Heins submit her dispute with a client to arbitration and comply with the result.

Heins, who earned her degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1991, has no history of professional discipline, and her license is in good standing, according to the State Bar and OLR websites. Follow @erikastrebel