CHARLESTON – The state Office of Disciplinary Counsel is asking the state Supreme Court to annul the law license of a Wheeling attorney who has been charged with three counts of violating the rules of conduct.
In recommended sanctions filed earlier this summer, ODC Chief Lawyer Disciplinary Counsel Rachael L. Fletcher Cipoletti asks the Justices to annul the license of Paul J. Harris as well as require him to comply with Rule 3.28 of the Rules of Lawyer Disciplinary Procedure and pay the cost of the proceedings.
In his proposal to the court, Harris says the three counts should be dismissed and asks the court to take no disciplinary action because the ODC has failed to meet its “absolute burden of clear and convincing evidence.”
Harris, a Wheeling attorney with more than 35 years of experience, repeatedly has denied any violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct.
According to the first count, attorney Elgine H. McArdle represented Healy Baumgardner, a former Fox News analyst and adviser to President Donald Trump and George W. Bush, in an Ohio County divorce proceeding.
In a letter sent to the Office of Lawyer Disciplinary Counsel dated March 27, 2017, McArdle expressed concern about how Harris and his firm allegedly mishandled more than $600,000 that was to be placed into an irrevocable family trust to benefit Baumgardner and her now ex-husband Emil Nardone. Instead, McArdle says Harris placed the money into his IOLTA (Interest on Lawyer Trust Account) account and testified he used the funds for his “fees.”
In his response to the ODC letter notifying him of the complaint, Harris said Nardone signed off on every transaction related to fees. In his August 14 answer, Harris also says there has been longstanding animosity between him and McArdle. He also says Baumgardner, who he calls “the real party of interest” in the case, knew of the alleged conduct more than two years before the complaint was filed, thus the statute of limitations had expired.
In his answer, Harris also says McArdle filed an ethics motion to “obtain an advantage in litigation.”
Harris, who was admitted to the bar in 1987, had represented the couple previously after they were targeted in a 2012 federal investigation about billing practices of Nardone’s chiropractic clinic. He also sued The Health Plan of the Upper Ohio Valley on behalf of Nardone in 2013 for alleged withholding of reimbursements to his clinic for services.
In July 2013, the LDB statement says Harris created two irrevocable trust agreements. Both were named The Nardone Family Trust. One made Nardone the sole beneficiary, and the other made both he and Baumgardner beneficiaries. In the 2016 divorce, it was alleged Nardone and Harris, who did not represent Nardone in the divorce, conspired to divert more than $600,000 in marital assets to avoid equitable distribution to Baumgardner.
McArdle also said Harris opened a bank account in Baumgardner’s name without her knowledge and deposited nearly $93,000 in it. He then wrote himself a check for $92,000 and deposited it into his IOLTA account, the statement charges.
In addition, it says the couple’s home was sold in 2014, and Nardone wrote a check for $235,000 to Harris’ law office. Harris deposited that check into his IOLTA account and designated it for his fees, according to the statement. It says Nardone and Harris did something similar with a $115,000 check in 2013, and it claims Nardone liquidated stock accounts in 2015 to allow he and Harris to do something similar with a check for $200,000.
In 2017, Harris filed a petition for declaratory judgment to have the trust with both parties as beneficiaries dissolved following the divorce, claiming Baumgardner’s rights to the trust ended upon the divorce.
In late 2018, attorney Mike Kelly was representing Baumgardner in the matter and filed a motion to disqualify Harris because he drafted both trusts and was listed as a trustee for them. The court granted that motion. The trust case was settled in 2021 and, in 2022, the court granted a motion appointing a new trustee.
In the second count against Harris, Rocky A. Tingler filed an ethics complaint against him in 2021 alleging he paid Harris $50,000 in 2017 to represent him in a federal criminal case. Tingler says Harris never appeared on his behalf, didn’t appear at any hearings and didn’t consult with him about the case.
In his answer, Harris again says the statute of limitations had expired on Tingler’s complaint because it was filed “well beyond two years” after Tingler knew or should have known of any alleged violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct, Still, Harris answers and denies the allegations of wrongdoing, saying he again did not violate any Rules of Professional Conduct.
After Tingler pled guilty to one count of false statement on a tax return and one count of failure to pay over employment taxes and was sentenced to six months in prison, he says he terminated Harris’ representation and asked for a complete copy of his file, a detailed invoice of work performed on his behalf and a return of the balance of the $50,000.
When Harris finally provided the file to Tingler’s new attorney, according to the statement of charges, Tingler said “there was nothing in (Harris’s) invoice that related to services rendered in Mr. Tingler’s federal criminal case, other than legal and case law research.” It also included billing for conferences with Tingler that allegedly did not occur, according to the statement of charges.
Harris eventually provided a refund of just over $5,000 and “threatened to sue Attorney (Dean) Summers personally if he proceeded with filing a case” against Harris, according to the statement.
Harris also denied wrongdoing to the ODC when it mailed him a letter about Tingler’s complaint against him.
According to the third count, Thomas M. Carr filed an ethics complaint against Harris in June 2022. It said Carr sold three properties in Iowa for more than $600,000 after his wife died in November 2020. The proceeds from those sales were wired to Harris, who represented Carr in a variety of legal matters.
In his answer, Harris again denies the allegations and denies any violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct.
Carr said Harris had him wire $300,000 to retain him as counsel in November 2020. Carr said 2Harris also received a check for $200,000 from a mine subsidence claim. Carr says his homeowner’s insurance coverage was dropped in 2022 because Harris held the mine subsidence check funds and didn’t allow Carr to have his home repaired. In total, Carr said Harris couldn’t account for more than $1.2 million of the family’s money.
In his answer, Harris says he had represented the Carr family many years ago. When Travis Carr, Thomas Carr’s son, contacted Harris in 2020, he says it was learned that not only had annual filings not been made for the conservatorship of Thomas Carr’s disabled adult daughter, but also that tax returns had not been filed in almost a decade.
Harris says Thomas Carr was updated in the legal matters, noting he traveled to Carr’s house to meet with him several times. He denies the allegations and denies violating the Rules of Professional Conduct. He says he did his work for the Carr family in a timely manner.
In the ODC’s June 12 recommendation to the Supreme Court, it says Harris “failed to avoid a conflict of interest, charged an unreasonable fee and knowingly misappropriated and converted to his own benefit funds that had been entrusted to him in a professional and fiduciary capacity and inflicted injuries upon his clients, the public and the legal profession.”
“The repeated acts of misconduct as contained in the record touches the very essence of the public’s perception of the legal system,” the ODC filing states. “A license to practice law is a revocable privilege and when such privilege is abused, the privilege should be revoked.
“Indeed, for the public to have confidence in the integrity of our disciplinary and legal system, lawyers who engage in the conduct of respondent (Harris) must receive a strong and serious sanction.
“Such sanction is also necessary to deter other lawyers from engaging in similar conduct and to restore the faith of the victims in these cases and of the general public in the integrity of the legal profession.”
In the proposal, also filed June 12, Harris and his attorney Robert P. Fitzsimmons say the adage “where there is smoke, there is fire” does not and should not apply to this case.
They say the ODC has failed to prove every allegation with clear and convincing evidence, and they say it is clear each complainant “had an ulterior motive” in bringing the complaints.
“Two of the cases’ principal witness and/or complainant are convicted criminals and admitted liars,” the filing states. “Paul Harris does admit he was very bad about client selection in these cases, but that does not give rise to an ethics violation.”
Harris’ filing says the Nardone matter should be dismissed as untimely, having passed the statute of limitations when it first was filed. It also says Baumgardner should be the true party of interest instead of McArdle, but it also says McArdle had animosity with Harris and was trying to gain an improper advantage in litigation. The filing also alleges Baumgardner declined to appear at a hearing “when it became clear that she had lied about her education and background.”
Harris’ filing also says the Tingler matter should be dismissed because it also had passed the statute of limitations while also noting Tingler was a multiple convicted felon trying to retrieve money he knew was non-refundable.
In the Carr matter, Harris’ filing says Thomas Carr was declared not able to testify because of his disabilities. His son Travis Carr testified, but they call his behavior “so outrageous and unresponsive” that his testimony should be stricken.
“Travis Carr lied about his qualifications, lied for sexual advantages, lied to the Internal Revenue Service and lied to courts and tribunals,” the filing states. “He clearly wanted access to his severely disabled sister’s settlement money (an approximate $2.5 million trust fund) and fired Mr. Harris when Mr. Harris wouldn’t help him gain access to the trust monies as conservator. …
“Travis Carr is a liar, bad con artist and trying to use his severely disabled sister Brittany Carr’s trust account to support himself.”
It also says Travis Carr lied about being a disable veteran and exerted undue pressure on his father to stop working with Harris after Harris’ paralegal refused to continue a romantic relationship with Travis Carr.
According to court filings, Harris has been the subject of two previous admonishments by the LDB in 1995 and by the state Supreme Court in 2001.
West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals case number 23-419; Lawyer Disciplinary Board I.D. numbers 17-03-136 (McArdle), 21-01-230 (Tingler) and 22-02-240 (Carr)