by Mara Leveritt

As printed in the Arkansas Times

The legal profession holds itself to be an honorable one. It has a system for policing itself. In Arkansas, if someone has a complaint about the behavior of a lawyer, the body that is supposed to review it is the Arkansas Supreme Court's Committee on Professional Conduct. The committee's executive director, James A. Neal, is supposed to check out the complaints, and see that they are properly handled.

"Supposed to" are the key words here. Over the years, I have learned of a few lawyers whose suspected illegal or unethical behavior has been reported to Neal's committee, with no apparent action having been taken -- not even so much as a response to the person or persons who filed the complaint. In two of those cases, the lawyers in question moved on to bigger crimes, for which they were finally convicted.

Questions to Neal about the committee were generally fruitless. He and the committee answered to no one except for the members of the Arkansas Supreme Court. It was in some ways a black hole. Information went in. What happened to it, in many instances, no one ever knew. Suddenly, that may have changed, thanks to an out-of-state legal foundation that had the nerve to object to the committee's own questionable behavior. Here's how this remarkable -- and overdue -- change has come about:

In September 1998, in the wake of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, the Atlanta-based Southeastern Legal Foundation (SLF) filed a complaint with Neal and the committee seeking disciplinary actions against Clinton for violating Arkansas rules of professional conduct involving "dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation." Months passed. The SLF heard nothing from Neal.

In February 1999, federal district court Judge Susan Webber Wright, issued a civil contempt citation for Clinton's misrepresentations while under oath in the Paula Jones case. Her citation read, in part, that Clinton's "conduct in this case, coming as it did from a member of the bar and the chief law enforcement officer of this Nation, was without justification and undermined the integrity of the judicial system."

Wright's contempt citation was forwarded to the Arkansas Committee on Professional Conduct. Coming from a judge, it should have automatically triggered a review. But again, nothing happened. The black hole had swallowed the complaints and, as usual, that seemed to be the end of that.

The turn-around came last December, when the SLF took the highly unusual step of filing a legal action -- a writ of mandamus -- with the Arkansas Supreme Court. In it, the SLF formally requested that the Arkansas Supreme Court abide by Arkansas law and order Neal's committee to fulfill its obligation and pursue a formal complaint against Clinton.

This week, Matthew Glavin, the foundation's president, told me that his firm had contacted "close to 20 attorneys" in Arkansas, asking that they serve, with pay, as co-counsel in that action. He said they could find none who would agree. (Glavin attributed the reluctance to Clinton's "enormous influence" in Arkansas, but I wonder if the real reason might be that lawyers don't want to get anywhere near the suggestion that a committee overseen by the Arkansas Supreme Court -- a court before which they could appear -- might not be doing its job.)

In any event, Neal responded as he always has when questioned about the committee's activities. They are confidential, he said, and furthermore, no one could order him to do anything, as it was up to him to decide whether any action on a complaint would or would not be taken.

The SLF countered that "Neal cannot sit and do nothing when complaints are filed against Arkansas attorneys." It argued that Neal's duties were clear under the law: that he was required to decide "promptly and efficiently" whether each and every complaint he received alleged a bona fide violation and, if so, whether the allegation was supported by evidence. Once that decision was made, the complaint was either to go before the committee for review, or the person who filed the complaint was to be informed by letter that the complaint was deemed insubstantial, in which case the complainant might request a review.

The fact that none of this had happened in the Clinton case, the SLF argued, "erodes public confidence in the attorney disciplinary system."

To its credit, the Arkansas Supreme Court agreed. It ruled that Neal cannot let complaints filed against lawyers languish. However reluctant he may be to do so, Neal must act. He must either reject a complaint and notify the complainant that he has done so, or he must accept it and bring it before the committee for consideration. And he must do so "promptly and efficiently." The committee now knows it has a job and that a clock is ticking. Add that to Clinton's legacy.

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