LETTER: Local attorney disputes claims of wrongdoing

(EDITOR’S NOTE: The following letter was received from attorney David Tennant In response to the Inter Lake’s April 20 front-page story entitled “Attorney faces professional misconduct accusations.”)

The Office of Disciplinary Counsel alleges I represented a man in a matter longer after the date I agreed to represent him pursuant to our contract with the client.

I agreed to represent the complainant in a divorce. The divorce decree was entered. At that point, my representation was over pursuant to our written contract. After that, I represented him in a contempt matter. Pursuant to the rules of professional conduct, you do not need to set out a new contract with former clients unless your hourly billing rate changes. We concluded that matter at a hearing.

About six months after that, we foreclosed on an attorney lien because he did not make any payments to the firm. The ODC’s case rests on the fact that a notice was not filed with the court that we were no longer the attorneys to be served by mail if there was any future litigation. My staff generally files that document when we go to put a file in storage. We never got to that point in this case because we were never paid.

There is no rule of professional conduct requiring that document to be filed to terminate representation, but that is the argument the ODC is making. If the ODC alleges that is a requirement, where would the document get filed in a transactional matter?

The ODC alleges I had a conflict of interest because they assert I still represented the client during the foreclosure. The foreclosed property is on the market. If the complainant wants it back, all he needs to do is contact me arrange to pay what he owes. That includes $34,000 he owed the firm for services and attorney fees to collect our fees pursuant to our contract with him, repaying the $6,750 I paid to his ex-wife to satisfy a lien she had on the property for his unpaid child support obligation, repaying the $6,839.46 I paid for past due taxes on the property that almost resulted in a tax deed being issued, and paying approximately $800 of additional property taxes I paid this year. I also have about $25,000 or so of additional time into this matter dealing with the mess he left.

—David G. Tennant, Kalispell