Attorney Misconduct, Lawyer of the Day

Ragin' Cajun Courtroom Fracas

By  
on

Lawyer fight! The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that competition for clients is heating up in the bayou:

Two attorneys competing for clients, prestige and a bounty of legal fees opened a hearing at Orleans Parish Civil District Court on Monday with a schoolyard brawl that shocked the buttoned-up crowd and ended with one led away in handcuffs on charges of contempt.

The best thing about lawyer fights are the clever euphemisms that the combatants use to explain just how badly they got their asses kicked. Remember this Louisiana throw down between attorneys who were also in-laws?

“I said, ‘You just bought yourself a ticket to a bar (association) complaint.’ He grabbed me by the neck and started swinging me back and forth. .¤.¤. He hurt me substantially. I became woozy and fell.”

This time, both battling attorneys (Madro Bandaries and J. Robert Ates) offered competing explanations as to how they were so easily and quickly defeated.

The case of Glass Joe versus Captain Inaction continues after the jump.


Only one of the lawyers left the courtroom in handcuffs. The other guy (Bandaries) traded his pugilistic dignity for this quote:

Sponsored

Bandaries said he was sitting at the table when Ates came up behind him, put his hands on his shoulders and said something about Monday being Bandaries’ funeral or the case’s funeral. Bandaries claims that Ates then turned him around and pushed him.

“Next thing you know, he has me on the floor,” Bandaries testified, his voice shaking. The New Orleans lawyer later said outside the courtroom that two titanium plates in his neck were sore because of the fight.

For those scoring along at home, Bandaries wants you to know that you should feel free to walk up behind him and threaten his life, but he won’t turn around. You can then get him to the ground with one push, yet still be on top of him before he has time to react. If you do this, you will shake him to his metal core.

If Bandaries’s wife/partner is attractive, just know that Bandaries won’t put up much of a fight …

Meanwhile, Ates the Victor, tried his best to act like the lesser man:

Ates said it was Bandaries who provoked the scuffle. As he began setting up his materials and greeting other lawyers, Ates contended, Bandaries made “a snide remark.”

“I tried to ignore that, and then he made another one,” said Ates,

Sponsored

Okay, but after the second insult, then you went into “Undertaker” mode?

“At that point, he grabbed the lapel of my coat and my tie and he pushed on me,” Ates said. “I pushed him back, at which time he attempted to kick me in the scrotum.”

“And the people all said sit down. Sit down you’re rocking the boat. And the devil will drag you under by crocked tie around your wicked throat.”

Somewhere out there, Darwin is shaking his head.

Brawl erupts between two lawyers at civl court. Rival class-action suits involving [New Orleans Times-Picayune]

Earlier: Lawyers of the Day: Michael Fawer and Joseph Bartels

Topics