Once disbarred for ignoring suspension, lawyer is permanently disbarred for continuing to practice
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A Miami Beach, Florida, lawyer who was disbarred for ignoring a suspension, was permanently disbarred after he repeatedly challenged the original disbarment and filed requests to represent people in eight cases.
The Florida Bar announced the permanent disbarment of Erwin Rosenberg, on Nov. 21, report the Miami Herald and the Florida Record.
Rosenberg was suspended for a year in June 2015 after a judge sanctioned him for failing to comply with an order to produce client documents in a lawsuit. He tried to relitigate the sanctions order, failed to pay an attorney-fee sanction, and filed numerous motions with the Florida Supreme Court that were “procedurally improper and without merit,” the Florida Supreme Court said in imposing the suspension (PDF).
The referee who recommended a suspension said that that Rosenberg apparently “lacks either the common sense or the intellectual honesty to distinguish appropriate and rational arguments from inappropriate and irrational arguments.”
Despite the suspension, Rosenberg filed pleadings on behalf of a client, continued to represent a client in another case, and held himself out as a lawyer, according to a petition (PDF) for contempt filed by the Florida Bar. The Florida Supreme Court responded by disbarring Rosenberg in April 2016 (PDF).
Following the disbarment, Rosenberg sought leave to represent clients in eight cases in pleadings that repeatedly challenged the Florida Supreme Court’s authority to disbar him, the Florida Bar alleged in its latest petition (PDF) for contempt. The permanent disbarment was issued in September.
