Lawyer With Client’s Time on Hands Gets Suspension

Sometimes a lawyer can be too flashy for his own good.

Take Woodland Hills attorney Barry B. Martin, who in 1988 was charged with misconduct by the State Bar of California on the grounds that he failed to perform his professional duties for at least four clients and took a Rolex watch from one of them.

The state Supreme Court voted 5-2 Thursday to suspend Martin from practice for two years. The justices also ordered Martin, who could not be reached for comment, to return the watch to the client or pay him $1,000.

But Justice Armand Arabian, obviously angry over Martin’s behavior before the high court, also lashed out at the lawyer for flashing the watch at the justices.

Arabian, who voted to disbar Martin, wrote that when Martin was asked by the justices where the watch was, he “had the audacity . . . to reach into his pocket and display it to the court.”

“A Rolex watch is famous for its ability to perform at great heights and extreme depths. True to its reputation, it evidences here both the height of . . . chicanery and the depth of his deception,” the justice wrote.

Martin “would have benefited rather from the use of a moral compass than from the wrongful retention of his client’s timepiece,” Arabian said.