{"id":4787,"date":"2004-04-16T01:28:36","date_gmt":"2004-04-16T05:28:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/formerlyknownas\/2004\/04\/16\/a-deadly-argument-for-diligen"},"modified":"2011-08-05T14:58:52","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T18:58:52","slug":"a-deadly-argument-for-diligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/2004\/04\/16\/a-deadly-argument-for-diligence\/","title":{"rendered":"A Deadly Argument for Diligence?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a name='a1239'><\/a><\/p>\n<p><DIV dir=\"ltr\" align=\"left\"><FONT face=\"Arial\"><FONT size=\"2\">There&#8217;s nothing funny about a murdered lawyer and a client arrested as the alleged killer, but that&#8217;s the story from Auburn, Washington.&nbsp;(<EM><A href=\"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/localnews\/2001903783_arrest15m.html \">Seattle Times<\/A><\/EM>, &#8220;Client arrested in beating that killed Auburn lawyer,&#8221; 04-15-04)&nbsp; <EM>The Seattle Times<\/EM> reports that attorney William W. Messer was found dead in his office and that:<\/FONT><\/FONT><\/DIV><br \/>\n<BLOCKQUOTE><br \/>\n<DIV dir=\"ltr\" align=\"left\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\"><br \/>\n<P><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">&#8220;Police said the suspect was one of Messer&#8217;s clients and met with Messer at 5:30 p.m., Monday. The two argued, and the suspect left Messer&#8217;s office at 1340 M St. S.E. He returned later and clubbed Messer to death, according to a police news release.&#8221;<\/FONT><\/P><\/DIV><\/BLOCKQUOTE><br \/>\n<UL><br \/>\n<LI><br \/>\n<DIV><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">In a testament to the swiftness of internet communication, the South King County Bar Association told its 250 members of Messer&#8217;s death, in an emailed newsletter, <EM>prior<\/EM> to the official identification of the victim by the police and Coroner.&nbsp;(<EM><A href=\"http:\/\/www.kingcountyjournal.com\/sited\/story\/html\/161228\">King County Journal<\/A><\/EM>, &#8220;Auburn lawyer found killed,&#8221; 04-14-04)<\/FONT><\/DIV><\/LI><\/UL><br \/>\n<P dir=\"ltr\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">We don&#8217;t know if the unidentified, 42-year old client is guilty, nor&nbsp;why he had argued with Messer, a bankruptcy and personal injury lawyer, admitted to practice in 1978, who appears to be a solo practitioner.&nbsp;&nbsp;Perhaps Messer confronted the accused with suspicions about the break-ins.&nbsp; However, an <A href=\"http:\/\/www.nylawyer.com\/news\/04\/04\/041504k.html\">article<\/A> in&nbsp;<EM>New York Lawyer&nbsp;<\/EM>noted that <\/FONT><\/P><br \/>\n<BLOCKQUOTE><br \/>\n<P dir=\"ltr\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\"><EM>Messer was admonished in December, the mildest discipline given by the Washington State Bar Association, for failing to appear at a bankruptcy hearing, resulting in repossession of a car from two of his clients, records showed.<\/EM>&nbsp;<\/FONT><\/P><\/BLOCKQUOTE><br \/>\n<P dir=\"ltr\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">More troubling (and somewhat surprising given the freshness of his death), the article reports that &#8220;<U>Other bankruptcy lawyers said they had taken over cases from Messer because clients were upset about the way he was representing them<\/U>.&#8221; (<EM>NYL<\/EM>\/AP, &#8220;Lawyer Beaten to Death, Client Arrested,&#8221; 04-15-04)&nbsp;&nbsp; <FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">A <A href=\"http:\/\/pro.wsba.org\/PublicView-Discipline.asp?Usr_Discipline_ID=565\">Discipline Notice<\/A> on the WSBA website confirms the admonition, &#8220;effective January 21, 2004 for failing to diligently represent a client.&#8221;<\/FONT><\/FONT><\/P><br \/>\n<P dir=\"ltr\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/blogs\/static\/ethicalesq\/sailboatgrayneg.jpg\" alt=\"sailboat neg\" \/>&nbsp; Messer was <A href=\"http:\/\/www.kingcountyjournal.com\/sited\/story\/html\/161228\">apparently<\/A> divorced last year and was to marry May 1st.&nbsp; I don&#8217;t have any first-hand information about his reputation or practice habits, or whether he has been going through tough times that affected his lawyering.&nbsp; It would, however, be a terrible lesson for the bar if a disgruntled client, due to unsatisfactory service or an adverse result caused by lawyer neglect, responded with deadly rage.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/FONT><\/P><br \/>\n<P dir=\"ltr\"><FONT face=\"Arial\" size=\"2\">Every client is owed diligence and competence.&nbsp; However, in cases where clients are emotionally distraught (as is often the case in personal bankruptcy, divorce, and personal injury cases), it is especially important that lawyers&nbsp;act with diligence and respect &#8212; with people skills, as well as professional skills and temperament.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Perhaps,&nbsp;Bill Messer&#8217;s death will help remind other lawyers going through&nbsp;travails in their own personal lives that there are&nbsp;programs to help them keep their practices on an even keel while they weather their own&nbsp;storms.<\/FONT><\/P><br \/>\n<UL><br \/>\n<LI><br \/>\n<DIV><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/blogs\/static\/ethicalesq\/redsailboat001.jpg\" alt=\"sailboat red\" \/>&nbsp; One bankruptcy lawyer who I don&#8217;t think will ever have to worry about enraged clients, nor lack of diligence, is <STRONG>Sherry Fowler<\/STRONG>, a\/k\/a <A href=\"http:\/\/civpro.blogs.com\/civil_procedure\/\">Scheherazade<\/A>.&nbsp; Sherry has been musing in public about <A href=\"http:\/\/civpro.blogs.com\/civil_procedure\/2004\/04\/zag.html\">zagging<\/A> away from the practice of law, just three years out of law school.&nbsp;&nbsp; The cliched response &#8212; and a valid one &#8212; is that the legal profession needs more people like Sherry (smart, caring, hard-working).&nbsp; But, I think she should be asking what&#8217;s good for Scheherazade &#8212; the artful storyteller, entrepeneur, star-gazer and collector of friends and tales &#8212; <EM>not<\/EM> what&#8217;s good for the profession.&nbsp; <\/DIV><\/LI><br \/>\n<UL><br \/>\n<LI><br \/>\n<DIV>Thirty years after starting law school, I have seen far too many men and women with legal careers, who didn&#8217;t listen to their hearts, when the inner voice said it was time to zag, chase, dreams, spread their wings and their sails.&nbsp; Soon, golden handcuffs, or family responsibilities, or inertia tied them to a career that might engage their brains (occasionally), or their competitive juices, but didn&#8217;t nurture their spirit.&nbsp; <\/DIV><br \/>\n<LI><br \/>\n<DIV>So, I&#8217;m hoping that Scheherazade will (1) listen to her heart; (2) have the courage of her own convictions and faith in her many talents; and (3) keep talking to her friends regularly at <A href=\"http:\/\/www.scheherazade.org\/\">scheherazade.org<\/A>.&nbsp; Meanwhile, I&#8217;m looking forward to hearing the rest of this inevitable story.<\/DIV><\/LI><\/UL><\/UL><\/FONT><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s nothing funny about a murdered lawyer and a client arrested as the alleged killer, but that&#8217;s the story from Auburn, Washington.&nbsp;(Seattle Times, &#8220;Client arrested in beating that killed Auburn lawyer,&#8221; 04-15-04)&nbsp; The Seattle Times reports that attorney William W. Messer was found dead in his office and that: &#8220;Police said the suspect was one [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2926],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pre-06-2006"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kP1R-1fd","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13887,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4787\/revisions\/13887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/ethicalesq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}