Milwaukee attorney responds to misconduct allegations

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A Milwaukee attorney who faces revocation of his law license has responded to allegations that he violated the state’s lawyer-ethics rules 20 times.

In a complaint filed in December, the Office of Lawyer Regulation charged Michael Krill of Michael M Krill Law Office with 20 counts of misconduct.

The alleged violations included failing to hold client money in trust, distributing client money held in trust without his client’s permission and without providing documentation of how that money was spent, lying to the OLR, helping a client defraud a third party by preparing forged and fraudulent documents and disobeying a court order.

Some of the behavior laid out in the complaint has caused Krill to spend time in jail. In September, a Racine County judge ordered Krill to pay $301,412.41 to a client and also sent him to jail for 30 days with work-release privileges as a contempt sanction and ordered him to pay $48,000 for failing to return the money ordered by the court.

The OLR is asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to revoke Krill’s license, meaning he would be indefinitely banned from practicing law, although he would be able to petition for reinstatement after five years.

The OLR is also asking the justices to order Krill to pay the $301,442.41 judgment as a condition for reinstatement and that the court order Krill to pay nearly $150,000 in restitution to the clients and parties he had defrauded.

Krill, representing himself, responded to the OLR’s complaint on March 20, denying he had committed the 20 violations of the state’s lawyer-ethics rules and asserting several affirmative defenses, including one that contends the OLR’s “negligence and failure to act with due diligence contributed to the alleged damages the agency is seeking.”

The court has appointed Jonathan Goodman as the referee in the case. He will make recommendations to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, which will review them and make a final decision in the matter. Follow @erikastrebel