Olivia Covington for www.theindianalawyer.com

An Indianapolis attorney who was recently diagnosed with a mental health condition has been suspended from the practice of law and must participate in recovery services with the Indiana Judges and Lawyers Assistance Program.

The misconduct at issue in In the Matter of: Hilary Bowe Ricks, 49S00-1612-DI-682, centers on Hilary Bowe Ricks’ representation in two post-conviction relief cases, for which she had accepted client retainers. In the first case, Ricks never completed a review of the record, nor did she request the record from the Indiana Court of Appeals. She also did not respond to messages from the client and the client’s mother seeking information about the case and, later, seeking a refund and return of case materials.

Similarly, a year of inaction passed in the second case before the client and a prison volunteer asked Ricks to forward the client’s funds, which were held in trust, to another legal service provider. Ricks also ignored those requests, and both clients filed grievances with the Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission.

Ricks then failed to cooperate with the commission’s investigations, prompting two noncooperation proceedings. She eventually complied after the Supreme Court issued show cause orders, but she acknowledged she did not have an excuse for her failure to timely comply.

Then in 2017, Ricks was diagnosed with panic and depressive disorders, according to the Supreme Court’s order handed down Thursday. Her condition was undiagnosed at the time of her ethical violations, the court said, and she has since begun treatment and is involved with JLAP.

After noting that Ricks has faced discipline for similar conduct in the past in Matter of Ricks, 835 N.E.2d 208 (Ind. 2005), the justices determined she had violated four Indiana Rules of Professional Conduct:

• Rule 1.3, failing to act with reasonable diligence and promptness;

• Rule 1.4(a)(4), failing to comply promptly with a client’s reasonable request for information;

• Rule 1.16(d), failing to refund an unearned fee and to promptly return client case file materials, and;

• Rule 8.1(b), knowingly failing to respond to a lawful demand for information from a disciplinary authority.

The court imposed a 180-day suspension on Ricks, beginning Sept. 6, with 90 days served and 90 days stayed subject to the completion of probation. Ricks must comply with seven probation conditions, including:

• Entering a long-term JLAP monitoring agreement within 30 days;

• Fulfilling all requirements of the monitoring agreement;

• Reporting of her compliance to the commission by JLAP quarterly;

• Submitting a plan naming another lawyer to review her client files and take immediate protective action, if necessary, within 90 days;

• Committing no new violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct;

• Cooperating with the commission promptly and fully, and;

• Reporting probation and/or monitoring agreement violations to JLAP and the commission immediately.

If Ricks violates any of her probation conditions, the commission can petition to revoke her probation, which, if granted, would require her to actively serve the balance of her suspension. In that situation, she could only be reinstated through the procedures laid out in Admission and Discipline Rule 23(18)(b).

Ricks’ suspension is effective Sept. 6, and she is prohibited from taking on new clients between now and then. Her probation will remain in effect until it is terminated pursuant to a petition filed under Admission and Discipline Rule 23(16).

The costs of the proceeding are assessed against Ricks. All justices concurred.

By Janet Williams
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS—A federal judge Thursday rejected Attorney General Curtis Hill’s attempt to unravel the consent decree reached earlier this summer requiring Marion County to establish satellite voting sites in November and in future elections.

Senior Judge Sarah Evans Barker said Hill’s objections to the consent decree reached between the county election board and Common Cause of Indiana and the local branch of the NAACP are without merit.

Common Cause and the NAACP sued last year to require Marion County to provide more than one location for voters to cast ballots in advance of the election. The consent decree requires the election board to have six satellite voting sites in November.

A final decree, signed off on by all parties and approved by Barker in July, requires the county to have two satellite sites in the primary and five in the general election in future years.

Marion County, which is majority Democratic, was the only county in central Indiana to have only one early voting site, prompting the voting rights lawsuit. The other counties are majority Republican.

Earlier Thursday, Indiana Solicitor General Thomas M. Fisher faced the media to defend the widely criticized decision of his embattled boss, Hill, to jump into the voting case.

“Our goal is rather routine,” Fisher said. “It is to defend the application of Indiana statutes as written.”

Fisher maintained the consent decree binds future election boards to the agreement. State law requires county election boards to unanimously approve satellite voting sites and the lone Republican member of the Marion County election board had, until the lawsuit, refused to approve it.

Noting that the state had argued that it is against the public interest to enforce a consent decree dictating how local elections are run, Barker said, “That is not a cogent objection; it is the expression of a preference by the Attorney General for noninterference in voting rights cases generally.”

She added that violations of federal rights justify the imposition of federal remedies.

Julia Vaughn, policy director of Common Cause of Indiana, and Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson, the state’s top election official, both blasted Hill’s action.

Vaughn said in a statement that Hill’s motion should be dismissed because it has no merit.

“The Attorney General is trying to disrupt a bipartisan agreement reached after months of negotiations,” she said.  “He is wasting taxpayer money on a partisan political fight.”

Lawson, whose name is on the court papers Hill’s team filed Tuesday, sharply criticized the attorney general for interfering in the case and for not notifying her that he was filing a motion to unravel the consent decree.

Fisher never directly answered questions about why Lawson’s office was never notified, except to say she was dropped as a defendant in the case last year.

A spokesman for Hill’s office said the attorney general will appeal Barker’s order to the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Hill, meanwhile, is being investigated by the state’s inspector general and a special prosecutor on charges that he groped four women at a downtown Indianapolis bar at the end of the 2018 regular session in March. State House and Senate leaders of both political parties as well as Gov. Eric Holcomb have called for Hill to resign. Hill has refused and denies any wrongdoing.

Janet Williams is executive editor of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.