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Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Ind. Courts - "State moves to suspend accused Roanoke lawyer"
So reports Rebecca S. Green in this story this morning in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette.
This follows on a long story by Green from Sept. 3, 2010, and an update from Jan. 29, 2011.
From today's story:
The Indiana Supreme Court’s Disciplinary Commission filed an emergency petition to suspend the law license of local attorney Daniel E. Serban, citing criminal charges filed against him.Serban, of Roanoke, faces charges of corrupt business influence, forgery, and two counts of theft. Charged last September, he is accused of failing to distribute money paid into the Serban Law Office’s Trust Account to clients or to those entitled by court order to receive it.
After his arrest, Serban told police some of the money he used to pay off the original client, after he was confronted, had been taken from money put into the trust account for an estate. He told investigators he forged the name of the estate’s personal representative on the check.
Attorneys are required to keep escrow-type accounts where money either coming from or going to their clients will be kept. Those accounts are to be treated with extreme fiduciary care, and attorneys have a strong ethical responsibility to protect that money. * * *
According to the petition filed last week in the Indiana Supreme Court, the state’s disciplinary commission received information about the allegations before the criminal case was filed.
Documents also outline other allegations against Serban, as well as a history of financial difficulties leading up to his September arrest.
In 2008, Serban wrote a check of nearly $40,000 to John Magnuson, who owned a collection company.
The check failed to clear because of insufficient funds and later Serban wrote Magnuson a certified check drawn on a different account for $11,547.
Serban still owes Magnuson the rest of the money, and Magnuson’s efforts to collect the money by hiring another attorney seems to have been unsuccessful, according to court documents.
A former legal assistant of Serban’s told investigators that over a three- to four-year period, $300,000 was collected on behalf of clients but not reimbursed, instead transferred to Serban, according to court documents.
Serban had an outstanding federal tax lien of $149,261 in 2005, as well as Indiana tax warrants for about $30,000, according to court documents.
He also had repeated overdraft notices on his personal bank account, according to the petition. * * *
Serban had been previously disciplined by the commission, but it was unclear from the online docket sheet when that occurred and what the nature of the discipline was.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on February 15, 2011 08:20 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts