Despite evidence that state bar prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence in a disciplinary case, the State Bar of California refused to appoint an outside investigator and refused to investigate the case itself. Instead, a senior state bar attorney allowed his employees to exonerate themselves. Meanwhile, in a related lawsuit, the state bar refused a settlement offer that would only have required the bar to refer criminal misconduct to the state attorney general’s office. The state bar instead chose to face trial rather than report the alleged crime (more on that below).
According to a letter that I received yesterday from Acting Assistant Chief Trial Counsel Donald R. Steedman, his employees had no legal duty to disclose evidence that contradicted their arguments before the state bar court. That’s not only wrong, it’s preposterous. Under California law, it is a crime for a prosecutor to hide evidence that tends to prove the innocence of the defendant.
As I reported two weeks ago, prosecutors Cydney Batchelor and Robert Henderson argued that my former client, Wade Robertson, had taken $3.5 million from his business partner, William C. Cartinhour, Jr., without using any of the money for its intended purpose of supporting litigation in New York. When an attorney in Alabama, Jason Yearout, told Ms. Batchelor that Mr. Robertson used at least some of the money to pay his firm for litigation expenses, she tried to cover up that discovery, telling Mr. Yearout that he “should forget the phone call ever happened.” … Read more