Lawyer Chosen to Aid O.C. Poor Is on Bar Probation

One of the attorneys selected this week by a panel of Santa Ana judges to share the county’s largest contract for defending poor clients is on probation for legal misconduct, State Bar of California records show.

Santa Ana attorney Patrick D. McNeal was placed on three years’ probation in May after he failed to provide status reports or file appropriate documents for a client in a divorce case, records show. It was the bar’s second disciplinary action against McNeal in the past five years.

Presiding Central Municipal Court Judge Gregory H. Lewis, who proposed that McNeal share the $1-million-a-year contract with two other firms, said he was unaware of the disciplinary actions.

“Gosh, I’m taken aback by this,” Lewis said Friday. “Frankly, I’m not aware of any of this. Now, we can do some investigation, but that’s as much as I should say right now.”

McNeal did not return repeated telephone calls to his office Thursday and Friday.

The contract currently is held by Santa Ana attorney William W. Stewart, who has been criticized for his hands-off handling of the caseload. Stewart has business interests in Bogota, Colombia, and Las Vegas and sometimes communicates with court officials by telephone or fax from South America. There also have been complaints that Stewart has not provided enough attorneys to cover the Santa Ana cases.

In response, Lewis and other Central Court judges on Wednesday proposed rotating the contract between Stewart, McNeal and a law third firm. McNeal’s firm currently works as a backup to Stewart on the contract to defend people who can’t afford their own attorneys.

But under terms of that contract, Lewis confirmed Friday, any State Bar disciplinary action could be grounds for McNeal’s disqualification from future county business.

“I’m not saying that it would automatically disqualify him,” Lewis said, but he added that State Bar disciplinary action “is grounds for termination from the contract.”

Lewis has said that the contract reorganization proposed by the judges requires Stewart’s approval because more than a year remains on Stewart’s existing Central Court agreement, which he has held almost exclusively for the past 15 years. Friday, the judges were still awaiting Stewart’s decision.

But the disclosures involving McNeal may alter the panel’s plans.

According to State Bar records, McNeal, 45, was placed on probation two months ago in connection with his handling of a divorce case involving client Joyce Allard.

In October, 1990, Allard paid McNeal an advance of $1,151 to take her case, the records show. A month later, Allard’s divorce petition was filed in Orange County Superior Court.

Allard complained that from January, 1991, to January, 1993, McNeal failed to respond to her repeated attempts to obtain a status report on the case, bar records state. At one point, one of McNeal’s office staffers “falsely informed Allard that her divorce had been finalized,” according to bar officials.

State Bar officials said McNeal’s actions were violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct, resulting in the probation. The rules provide a guide for lawyers’ conduct.

McNeal’s probationary term, during which he can continue to practice law,is scheduled to end in May, 1997, a bar spokeswoman in San Francisco said.

During that time, however, the attorney must make quarterly reports to the State Bar’s probation monitor and pass the California Professional Responsibility Exam. Failure to abide by those terms could result in a suspension.

In a separate matter, McNeal was previously issued a private reproval or censure by the State Bar in connection with a 1989 case. Details of that incident were unavailable, but bar records show that it involved allegations that McNeal failed to communicate with a client and did not return “unearned fees.”

The 1989 incident was characterized as an “aggravating circumstance” during the bar’s consideration of the most recent disciplinary action.

Although McNeal’s probation does not restrict his practice, as long as he abides by the rules of probation, Lewis said terms of his contract with the county state that disciplinary proceedings initiated by the State Bar or failure to observe the Rules of Professional Conduct are grounds for contract revocation.

The third firm named to share the defense contract--the partnership of Creighton B. Laz and Edward W. Hall-- has a clean record with the State Bar.

Stewart also has not been the subject of bar discipline. Court records show, however, that bankruptcy proceedings are pending against Stewart’s real estate firm, which owns the building housing his Santa Ana law firm.

Terms of the county contract list bankruptcy actions against contract attorneys as grounds for termination. But Lewis said Central Court judges found that the Stewart bankruptcy concerned the attorney’s real estate partnership only and did not directly affect his law practice or contract performance.

The public defender’s office generally provides legal services to people who can’t afford their own attorneys, but it must defer to private firms under contract to the county when conflicts arise in cases where there are multiple defendants. In Santa Ana, Stewart’s firm has the contract for referrals. McNeal and Laz & Hall handle only those cases in which Stewart’s firm has declared a conflict.

The bar’s findings against McNeal clearly surprised Lewis, who described McNeal as having “a good reputation with me.”

“He’s been around an awfully long time,” Lewis said. “I’ve had no previous knowledge of this.”