La Crosse attorney faces 6-month license suspension

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A La Crosse attorney faces a six-month suspension of his law license over allegations that he had violated lawyer-ethics rules while working on a divorce case.

The Office of Lawyer Regulation filed a complaint on July 6 alleging that Donald Harman, a lawyer out of La Crosse, had committed three counts of misconduct while representing a man in a divorce case in La Crosse.

The OLR alleges that Harman, who represented the man for more than a year and charged nothing for his representation, made improper submissions to a family-court commissioner and had thus failed to competently represent his client.

The submissions included frivolous motions and letters, often with many attachments, presenting evidence to the court commissioner in the case even though there was no motion pending to show cause.

The letters did not conform to the basic requirements laid out in the state’s civil-procedure rules, and the family-court commissioner deemed them frivolous, according to the complaint.

The OLR also alleges that Harman disobeyed two court orders handed down in the case.

The first order, handed down in February 2016 by La Crosse County Family Court Commissioner Elizabeth Wright, required the parties to file joint federal and state tax returns and equally divide the refunds after had been processed in the opposing counsel’s trust account. The OLR alleges Harman took about six months to comply with the order. Wright later found Harman and his client in contempt for not following the order.

In September 2016, La Crosse County Circuit Court Judge Elliot Levine entered a $4,400 contempt judgment in favor of Legal Action of Wisconsin, which was representing the wife in the divorce case. The judgment was for having to respond to Harman’s frivolous motions in the case.

Legal Action requested that Harman, not his client, pay the judgment. Wright agreed about a month later.

In the second order, issued in October 2016, Wright noted that not only were the motions Harman filed frivolous but that the opposing counsel, in one instance, had to respond to a 619-page submission that contained “duplicative documents, Chinese text, improper transcripts, and personal information about the parties irrelevant to the matter.”

Harman has not paid the $4,400 judgment, according to the OLR and court records.

The OLR is asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to suspend Harman’s law license for six months and order Harman to pay the $4,400 contempt judgment.

Harman, reached Monday, said he had no comment.

He has 20 days to respond to the OLR’s complaint. Regardless of whether Harman answers it, the high court will review the matter and issue a final decision in the case.

Harman’s license is active and in good standing, according to the State Bar and OLR websites.

But this is not Harman’s first encounter with the OLR. The high court has previously disciplined Harman four times.

Harman, who earned his law degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1960, was last suspended in 2001 over eight counts of misconduct, including violating trust-accounting rules and failing to keep client matters confidential.

In 1998, the justices publicly reprimanded Harman for failing to act promptly in a client matter and failing to notify his client of a significant development in the case.

In 1989, Harman consented to a public reprimand for continuing to represent a client despite the presence of a conflict of interest and his committing various trust-account violations.

The high court publicly reprimanded Harman again in 1987 for charging excessive fees and failing to turn over files to a client whom he had ceased representing even though a court order him to do so. Follow @erikastrebel