In 2009, New York State Bar Association surveyed 51 jurisdictions (all the states of the U.S. and the District of Columbia) to verify what kind of discovery, if any, U.S. jurisdictions provide to attorneys in attorney disciplinary proceedings.
On June 4, 2009, after the full survey, the NYSBA came up with the following results (I reduced the results into a table for convenience of reading) :
Group1
|
Group2
|
Group3
|
8 states and 3 out of 4 NYS
departments appear to afford little to no discovery (page 5)
|
6 states and 1 NYS App. Div.
Judicial Department “appear to provide” for “limited discovery” (certain kind
of document production and witness information, but no express provision for
depositions by respondent attorney)
|
35 states and
the District of Columbia appear to provide for a fair amount of
discovery (some states make their regular civil rules of procedure fully applicable to attorney disciplinary proceedings)
|
1.
Nevada
2.
South Dakota
3.
Kansas
4.
Virginia
5.
Delaware
6.
Connecticut
7.
Massachusetts
8.
Rhode Island
9.
NYD AD1st
10.NYD AD3d
11.NYD AD4th
|
·
Colorado
·
Hawaii
·
Tennessee
·
Michigan
·
Pennsylvania
·
New Jersey
·
NYS AD2d
|
·
Wyoming
·
Texas
·
New Mexico
·
Idaho
·
Montana
·
Wisconsin
·
Oregon
·
West Virginia
·
Washington
·
Alaska
·
Maine
·
Utah
·
California
·
Arizona
·
North Dakota
·
Oklahoma
·
Nebraska
·
Missouri
·
Arkansas
·
Louisiana
·
Iowa
·
Minnesota
·
North
Carolina
·
South
Carolina
·
Mississippi
·
Florida
·
Indiana
·
Illinois
·
Kentucky
·
Georgia
·
District of Columbia
·
Alabama
·
Ohio
·
New Hampshire
·
Maryland
·
Vermont
|
- · Hawaii
- · New Jersey
- · New York
- · Alaska
- · Massachusetts
- · New Hampshire
- · Ohio
- · Pennsylvania
- · Connecticut
- · Washington
- · Kansas
- · California
- · Oregon
- · South Dakota
- · Mississippi
- · District of Columbia
- discovery (paper discovery, subpoena power for pretrial depositions and at the trial);
- applicability of evidentiary rules (exclusion of hearsay, for example);
- public due process hearings
The new disciplinary rules - that afford no discovery, subpoena power, evidentiary rules or public hearings to attorneys - were introduced on April 1, 2009.
Within 2 months time the New York State Bar Association surveyed 51 U.S. jurisdictions as to availability of procedural rights to attorneys in disciplinary proceedings, verified that New York belongs to the handful of the minority of states that do not provide any such rights - and did NOTHING about it, moreover, stated in the conclusions that no action is necessary to change the status quo.
How can the public rely upon zealous representation by attorneys whose association cannot even fight for equal rights of its members with the rest of New York population?