Biglaw, Crime

Biglaw Voyeur Attorney Faces The Music

Biglaw attorney tries to take videos in a gym bathroom -- this isn't going to end well at all.

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<sarcasm>Good news for all D.C. attorneys who are amateur photographers taking illicit voyeuristic pics of unsuspecting people: your legal careers may not be over!</sarcasm>

Professor Mike Frisch reports on a former Freshfields attorney who had a bit of a… lapse in judgment. This case before the District of Columbia Board on Professional Responsibility Hearing Committee, In re Kelly Cross, arose out a 2009 conviction for an incident in a Washington Sports Club.

The attorney, who was employed with the Freshfields law firm, had recently returned from a two-year stint in Germany. He was two days away from a scheduled civil union with his longtime partner.

Okay, well this story starts out pretty nicely, a kind of a love story.

He testified before the committee that he went on Craigslist that morning to identify a gym where he might find a same-sex encounter.

He further testified that he responded to several people. including someone who described himself as “a well-endowed bear who was interested in showing off in the SSS [shower, sauna, stall].”

Oh… well, so this is a bit of a different tale. But still not something to involve a disciplinary committee.

He brought a video camera with him that he concealed in a toiletries bag.

He described his intent was to have a “last fling here at the gym and wouldn’t it be nice to record some of [it].”

The ensuing encounter was with a person that the attorney  claimed to mistakenly have believed might be the aforesaid bear.

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“Might” be the “aforesaid bear.” This isn’t going to end well.

Rather, the victim/complainant was an attorney – a former Boston police officer and Assistant DA who was in private practice after a stint with the D.C. Attorney General ‘s Office.

He was looking to exercise and use the bathroom, nothing more.

Nope, not going well at all. But wait, there’s more!

The attorney took surreptitious video of the victim’s buttocks and genital area. He then attempted to take video from one bathroom stall of the victim in the adjacent stall and was discovered.

Chaos and an arrest followed.

The complainant and the attorney provided conflicting versions of what happened in the stalls.

The committee believed the complainant and found that (i) the Craigslist/bear story was false and (ii) he had assaulted the complainant in the chaos.

Coincidentally enough, “chaos and an arrest” is the name of my failed punk band.

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The Hearing Committee found the incident did not involve “moral turpitude,” which would have required disbarment, but instead recommended a three-year suspension. Despite the non-disbarment for the Biglaw voyeur, it is still not a recommended course of action.

In Camera [Legal Profession Blog]

Earlier: Peeping Tom Attorney Can Lawyer No More

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