IN RE: ATTORNEYS WHO ARE IN VIOLATION OF JUDICIARY LAW SECTION 468-A: (2008)

Section 468-a of the Judiciary Law requires every resident and nonresident attorney admitted to practice in the State of New York to file a biennial registration statement with the administrative office of the courts.   A biennial registration fee must be paid at the time the statement is filed.   This registration statement, which is mailed every two years by the Office of Court Administration to every attorney so admitted, must be timely filed and the fee paid regardless of whether the attorney is actually engaged in the practice of law in New York or elsewhere.   Attorneys who certify to the Chief Administrator of the Courts that they have retired from the practice of law are exempt from paying the registration fee at the time the statement is filed. Subdivision (5) of the statute provides further that “[n]oncompliance by an attorney with the provisions of this section and the rules promulgated hereunder shall constitute conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice and shall be referred to the appropriate appellate division of the supreme court for disciplinary action.”

Pursuant to this provision, petitioner Departmental Disciplinary Committee seeks an order suspending from the practice of law certain attorneys (whose last name begins with the letters E through K) who are in violation of the statute, in that they have failed to file the registration statement and pay the registration fee for one or more registration periods after due purported notification.   This is the second in a series of motions to suspend attorneys who have failed to file biennial registration statements with the Office of Court Administration.   The first petition to suspend non-compliant attorneys whose last names began with letters A-D was granted by order of this Court entered October 12, 2006.   This Court has previously held that failure to register or re-register, and pay the biennial registration fee constitutes professional misconduct warranting discipline (see Matter of Pierini, 21 A.D.3d 42, 797 N.Y.S.2d 65 [2005] ).   Between 1997 and 1999 this Court granted similar motions and suspended attorneys en masse for such failure to register or re-register, and pay the registration fee pursuant to Judiciary Law § 468-a (see Matter of Attorneys in Violation of Judiciary Law § 468-a, 257 A.D.2d 127, 689 N.Y.S.2d 100 [1999] ).

The attorneys in question have been duly notified of their noncompliance and given an opportunity to cure their default.   The Office of Court Administration mailed each of the defaulting attorneys a biennial registration form to their last known home address, a second notice to their last known business address, and a final notice to their home address.   Attorneys who remained in default following these three notices were referred to the Disciplinary Committee, which mailed a notice to the subject attorney that failure to register and pay past registration fees within 30 days would constitute grounds for an imminent suspension motion.   More than 30 days after the deadline, a list of approximately 820 defaulting attorneys was compiled by OCA and forwarded to the Committee.   The Committee then filed its motion for service by publication of the notice of petition to suspend.

Pursuant to the order of this Court entered August 16, 2007, which provided for service of the suspension motion by publication in the New York Law Journal for five consecutive days, a list of the defaulting attorneys along with their last known business addresses was so published commencing October 5, 2007.   A notice was also posted on the Court's website.

The 736 attorneys who remain in noncompliance with Judiciary Law § 468-a despite the notification process described above are the subject of the Committee's instant motion for suspension.

There is no opposition to the instant motion.

Accordingly, due to the continued failure to comply with the statute, petitioner's motion to suspend such attorneys shall be granted to the extent of suspending those attorneys whose names are enumerated in the attached schedule from the practice of law in the State of New York, effective 30 days from the date of this order, until further order of this Court.

Attorneys whose names are enumerated in the schedule attached to the Opinion Per Curiam suspended from the practice of law in the State of New York, effective March 6, 2008, and until the further order of this Court, as indicated.

All concur.