Price County attorney responds to OLR complaint

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A Price County attorney has responded to an ethics complaint filed by the Office of Lawyer Regulation, saying the agency doesn’t have some of its facts right.

The OLR charged Beth Bant in March with two counts of professional misconduct over allegations that she had lied to her former employer about going to a legal conference and continuing-legal-education seminar and that she had submitted altered travel receipts for the trip.

According to the OLR, Bant lied to her employer, Church Mutual Insurance Co., by saying she had been at an American Bar Association conference in New Orleans but left early because she had been assaulted. The OLR also alleges that she falsified receipts she had submitted for the trip. The company’s internal investigation into the matter revealed that Bant had also lied by saying she had stayed at a hotel in Madison while attending a continuing-legal-education seminar and that she had falsified the expense report she submitted to her employer.

The OLR is asking the justices to suspend Bant’s license for 6 months.

Bant is being represented by Peyton Engel of Madison-based Hurley Burish and Stanton.

She filed an answer to the complaint on April 26, denying some of the allegations in the OLR’s complaint and admitting to others.

Bant, for instance, alleges in the filing that she had asked her supervisor for permission to go to the Society of Compliance and Ethics Seminar in Arizona and was instead told to go to the ABA conference. Bant also denied that she had told her supervisor that she had been assaulted and that she had falsified receipts connected to the trip. She did admit to forging the receipts for the hotel stay associated with the CLE seminar but not falsifying the mileage report for it.

A referee will be assigned to the case and recommend disciplinary measures. The Wisconsin Supreme Court will review those findings and issue a final decision. Follow @erikastrebel