In re Tun

CourtDistrict of Columbia Court of Appeals
DecidedDecember 22, 2022
Docket22-BG-54
StatusPublished

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In re Tun, (D.C. 2022).

Opinion

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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS

No. 22-BG-054

IN RE HARRY TUN, RESPONDENT.

A Suspended Member of the Bar of the District of Columbia (Bar Registration No. 416262)

On Report and Recommendation of the Board on Professional Responsibility (Bar Docket No. 2017-D215) (Board Docket No. 19-BD-019)

(Argued October 26, 2022 Decided December 22, 2022)

Abraham C. Blitzer for respondent.

Myles V. Lynk, Senior Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, with whom Julia L. Porter, Deputy Disciplinary Counsel, was on the brief, for the Office of Disciplinary Counsel.

Before EASTERLY and ALIKHAN, Associate Judges, and RUIZ, Senior Judge.

ALIKHAN, Associate Judge: Considering the record before it, including

Disciplinary Counsel’s recommendations, the Ad Hoc Hearing Committee’s report,

and the respondent’s counterarguments, the D.C. Board on Professional

Responsibility concluded that Harry Tun had violated numerous Maryland Rules of

Professional Conduct by committing serious acts of repeated dishonesty. Despite 2

the Hearing Committee’s recommendation that Mr. Tun be suspended for three years

with a fitness requirement, the Board concluded that he should be disbarred.

Because Mr. Tun concedes that he violated the charged rules, and because

disbarment is within the acceptable range of outcomes for misconduct of this

magnitude, we agree with the Board’s recommendation and disbar Mr. Tun from the

practice of law in the District of Columbia. 1

I. Factual Background

A. Mr. Tun’s D.C. Bar Membership and Disciplinary History

Mr. Tun has been a member of the District of Columbia Bar since 1988. From

1993 to the present, he has received a total of five informal admonitions from the

D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel (formerly the Office of Bar Counsel) and two

suspensions from this court for violating various professional rules.

Mr. Tun’s disciplinary history is long, but we review it to provide an accurate

timeline of his misconduct. Mr. Tun received his first informal admonition in

November 1993 for violating D.C. R. Prof. Conduct 1.4(a) (failing to communicate

1 This court is able to discipline Mr. Tun for his violations of the Maryland Rules of Professional Conduct because the conduct giving rise to this proceeding had “its predominant effect in another jurisdiction in which the lawyer is also licensed to practice.” D.C. R. Prof. Conduct 8.5(b)(2)(ii); see In re Johnson, 158 A.3d 913, 915 n.1 (D.C. 2017) (“A lawyer admitted to our bar may be disciplined here for conduct occurring in another jurisdiction, and in appropriate cases, as here, subject to discipline here based on the ethics rules of the other jurisdiction.”). 3

with a client) and 1.5(b) (failing to provide a client with a written fee arrangement).

He received his second in February 1995 for violating then-Rule 1.15(b) (failing to

properly transmit funds to a third party). His third came in February 2004, this time

for violating Rules 1.15(a) (failing to maintain records of a client’s settlement

agreement) and 1.16(d) (failing to provide a client’s file). He received his fourth in

October 2011 for violating Rule 1.6(a) (improperly disclosing a client’s

confidences). And his fifth and final informal admonition came in October 2013 for

violating Rule 4.3(a)(1) (improperly advising an unrepresented person despite a

potential conflict with his client’s interests).

An informal admonition is a form of discipline. See D.C. Bar R. XI, § 3(a)(5).

Each letter of admonition that Mr. Tun received specified the rules he had violated

and explained that the admonition constituted discipline pursuant to D.C. Bar R. XI,

§ 3. And even though a recipient of an informal admonition can request a formal

hearing to challenge the charges, D.C. Bar R. XI, § 8(b), Mr. Tun did not do so.

In addition to being informally admonished, Mr. Tun was suspended in both

2011 and 2018 for separate violations of the District of Columbia’s professional

rules. In 2011, he received an 18-month suspension (with six months stayed in favor

of a one-year term of probation) for filing inaccurate Criminal Justice Act vouchers

with the Superior Court of the District of Columbia between 1999 and 2003. See In 4

re Tun (Tun I), 26 A.3d 313, 314 (D.C. 2011) (per curiam). His submissions double-

billed for work he had done, resulting in $16,034 of overpaid funds. Id. Mr. Tun

and Disciplinary Counsel eventually filed a petition for negotiated discipline, which

this court accepted at the Hearing Committee’s recommendation. Id. at 314-15.

The proceedings for Tun I, however, spawned yet another disciplinary action.

In 2018, Mr. Tun was suspended for one year for lying on a motion to recuse. See

In re Tun (Tun II), 195 A.3d 65, 68-72 (D.C. 2018). The motion, which Mr. Tun

filed while the Tun I proceedings were ongoing, falsely stated that the Tun I

investigation had concluded without any disciplinary action being instituted against

him. Id. at 69-70. In an effort to avoid blame for that misconduct, Mr. Tun also

gave intentionally false testimony to the Hearing Committee during the Tun II

proceedings. Id. at 74. While the Hearing Committee and Board both recommended

a one-year suspension, only the Board recommended an additional fitness

requirement. Id. at 71-72. After reviewing comparable cases and determining that

a showing of fitness was unnecessary, we suspended Mr. Tun for one year. Id. at

79. 2

One member of the panel would have imposed a fitness requirement. Tun II, 2

195 A.3d at 79 (Glickman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). 5

B. The Present Violations

Mr. Tun was admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court for the District

of Maryland in March 1993. He subsequently applied to renew his membership six

times: in May 1997, March 1999, March 2002, March 2005, March 2011, and

July 2017. Each application asked whether Mr. Tun had ever “been denied

admission to practice, disbarred, suspended from practice, or disciplined by any

court or bar authority.” On the first five renewal applications, he answered “no”

even though he had received one or more informal admonitions before each

application. On the sixth, which he submitted after his 2011 suspension, he

answered “yes,” disclosing the suspension but none of the informal admonitions.

The renewal application also asked whether Mr. Tun was the subject of any pending

disciplinary proceedings. To his credit, he answered “yes” to this question on his

fifth renewal application, which he submitted while Tun I was ongoing. But he

answered “no” to this question on his sixth renewal application, even though he was

in the middle of the proceedings that would ultimately result in his second

suspension. In each application, Mr. Tun “declare[d]” or “certif[ied]” under penalty

of perjury that his responses were true.

In August 2017, Mr.

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