Iowa lawyer disciplined after getting caught up in Nigerian inheritance scam

Somehow this old cartoon from the webcomic
Married to the Sea seemed very appropriate here

By now you may have heard about Robert Allan Wright, Jr., the Iowa lawyer who was disciplined December 6 by the Supreme Court of Iowa after getting involved in a Nigerian inheritance scheme. (Iowa Supreme Court Disciplinary Board v. Wright, 2013 Iowa Sup. LEXIS 123 -- this link will get you to the court's opinion, but only until Groundhog's Day).

Wright did not respond to a spam email from the widow of a hitherto unknown "Nigerian general;" he had a flesh and blood client sitting in his office who claimed he'd come into an enormous inheritance from a long lost cousin.

Granted, Wright was representing the client, a man named Madison, in a criminal matter. And, yes, Madison's allegedly dead cousin was in Nigeria. But all Madison had to do, he told Wright, was pay $177,660 in inheritance taxes due and owing; that, and procure an "anti-terrorism certificate," and the very next thing you know, he would come into $18.8 million. For his part in facilitating the transfer, Wright would be paid 10% of the amount recovered.

Apparently it never occurred to Mr. Wright to suggest that the amount of "tax" due be simply deducted from the payout. If it did occur to him, the scammers persuaded him that things could not be done that way.

The Iowa Supreme Court made it clear that Wright was not being disciplined for his mere credulity (slip op. at 9):

Wright is not the first Iowa lawyer who has become entangled in a deception with ostensible Nigerian connections. See Iowa Supreme Ct. Bd. of Prof’l Ethics & Conduct v. Jones, 606 N.W.2d 5, 9 (Iowa 2000) (noting the incidence of fraudulent transactions with purported connections to the country of Nigeria). Lawyers in other jurisdictions have also been entangled and deceived in such schemes in recent years. See, e.g., In re Maxwell, 334 B.R. 736, 738–41 (Bankr. M.D. Fla. 2005); Parker v. Williams, 977 So. 2d 476, 477–78 (Ala. 2007); Lappostato v. Terk, 71 A.3d 552, 559–60 (Conn. App. Ct. 2013); In re Reinstatement of Jones, 203 P.3d 909, 912–13 (Okla. 2009); see also Lucas v. BankAtlantic, 944 So. 2d 1031, 1032 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2006) (describing a deception originating in Africa).

Instead, where Wright went wrong was in helping Madison to raise money for the "tax" by borrowing money from other clients, sucking them into the scheme. Essentially, he violated rules requiring competence in client representation by failing to see through the inheritance scam, he failed to disclose his pecuniary interest in the scheme to the clients from whom he solicited loans, and he failed to protect the interests of his clients from whom loans were solicited. (Slip op. at 9-13.)

But Wright did not intend to defraud anyone. The Disciplinary Board acknowledged that Wright "clearly believed in the legitimacy of Madison's inheritance." Even as the disciplinary proceedings exposed the folly of his hopes, Wright kept right on believing that "one day a trunk full of . . . one hundred dollar bills is going to appear upon his office doorstep," according to the Disciplinary Board. Wright's conduct might be delusional, the Board asserted, but not fraudulent. (Slip op. at 8-9.) Nevertheless, because of his ethical lapses, Wright will be suspended from the practice of law in Iowa for at least a year.

It's easy to pile on the unfortunate Mr. Wright: All of us receive dubious inheritance proposals and spurious contract claims on a daily basis. We don't fall for them. I've got three new ones in my spam just this morning -- one from someone who is "in the military unit here in Afghanistan" who wants a partner she and her partners can trust to move "some amount of funds" out of the country. It's all legal, my correspondent assures me. A Mr. Buba has $20 million that he wants to move from his country -- he doesn't say which country -- but he'll give me 40% just for arranging the transfer. And Barrister Joshua Yohana from Burkina Faso wants me to help him move $30,400,000 left behind in his country by the late Libyan dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi. The surprising aspect of this morning's spam is that there are no Chinese businessmen who have sure-fire, eight-figure collection cases I can handle for them; I've had a lot of those lately, too.

But... what else is in my email today? The National Law Journal sends me updates morning and evening about superstar lawyers concluding mega-deals. My Twitter feed regularly carries more locally-tinged, but similar, stories from Crain's Chicago Business. And the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin sends me an email every evening where I learn about the latest triumphs of my brothers or sisters in the local bar, many of whom I know.

I wonder if Mr. Wright had a similar experience: He may have seen that there are big cases out there, big deals, enormous paydays for his Iowa brothers and sisters in the law.

But there are only a few rock stars in the law; most of the rest of us are flailing away in garage bands. For every Beatles-like success story, how many thousands of other lawyers remain Quarreymen all their professional lives?

The discrepancies between the top and the bottom of the legal profession are wide, and widening daily. Judges may chafe at the rising tide of pro se litigants in our courts, but many lawyers -- good, competent lawyers who, at one time, would have been engaged by those persons now proceeding pro se -- are drowning beneath that tide.

Litigation has been priced beyond the reach of many prospective clients -- but it is not only they who have suffered as a result.

So, this morning, I can't pile on poor Mr. Wright. I can't condone what he did... but I can understand, perhaps, why he grabbed onto that thin tale of big money with both hands, and kept holding on.