## Facts

- Wendell R. Wilson, a New Jersey attorney, faced eight ethics complaints; two alleged misappropriation of client funds.
- In one matter, Wilson handled a residential sale generating about $23,000 in proceeds and failed for nearly two years to pay the client those funds.
- Wilson eventually paid the client only after an ethics complaint was filed and never accounted for where the funds were during the delay.
- In another matter, Wilson received a $4,300 check payable to a client, forged the client’s endorsement, deposited the check proceeds, and did not deliver the funds to the client.
- The disciplinary authorities also found other misconduct (including deceit toward clients, disregard of client interests, advising fraud, and noncooperation in the disciplinary process).
- The Disciplinary Review Board recommended disbarment; the New Jersey Supreme Court reviewed that recommendation for final discipline.

## Issues

1. Whether an attorney’s knowing misappropriation of client funds requires disbarment rather than a lesser sanction.
2. Whether the court should announce a general rule governing sanctions for knowing misappropriation in future disciplinary matters.

## Decision

- The New Jersey Supreme Court ordered Wilson disbarred.
- The court held that disbarment was mandated by the knowing misappropriation alone and did not rely on the additional misconduct to determine the sanction.
- The court announced that, as a general matter, cases involving knowing misappropriation of client funds should result in disbarment, with the outcome expected to be almost invariable.

## Legal Principles

- Knowing use of client funds as the lawyer’s own constitutes misappropriation and violates the duty to promptly deliver client property.
- Misappropriation of client funds is treated as conduct fundamentally incompatible with continued practice and warrants disbarment as the appropriate discipline.
- In attorney discipline, protection of the public and preservation of trust in the bar justify a bright-line sanction where knowing misappropriation is proven.
- Once knowing misappropriation is established, other aggravating or mitigating considerations typically do not alter the required sanction of disbarment.

## Conclusion

The court disbarred Wilson and set a near-per se rule that knowing misappropriation of client funds results in disbarment, reflecting the central role of fiduciary trust and public protection in attorney discipline.


In re Wilson, 409 A.2d 1153 (N.J. 1979)