Milwaukee attorney charged with taking $30,000 from client for fake bribe

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A former Milwaukee attorney could spend 20 years in prison for trying to take a client’s money for a bribe he lied about setting up.

Federal prosecutors charged 50-year-old Mark Ruppelt with three counts of fraud on Friday. The complaint says Ruppelt told the client that he had arranged to pay a bribe to federal officials in exchange for a lighter sentence. Officials said he told the client he’d bribed a probation officer and took $30,000 of the client’s money to “100% secure” a specific assistant U.S. attorney’s assistance in reducing the sentence.

Officials said Ruppelt put the client on hold for several weeks, claiming the assistant attorney wanted to wait until political circumstances were more conducive to getting away with the bribe, and instructed the client to avoid putting anything in writing, explaining “there can’t be any trace of this.” The U.S. Attorney’s Office said officials had never been offered or agreed to accept a bribe.

If convicted, Ruppelt could spend 20 years in prison and owe a $250,000 fine.

Ruppelt has been the subject of more than one Office of Lawyer Regulation investigation. In 2017, he was charged with 18 counts of misconduct for taking $50,000 from a client’s trust account to buy a new home. He was also publicly reprimanded for having sex with a client he later married. Follow @WLJReporter