Arizona Attorney - December 2015

Douglas S. Younglove, Phoenix, was suspended for 60 days, effective Nov. 1, 2015. Mr. Younglove also was ordered to complete one year of probation upon reinstatement by enrolling in the State Bar’s Law Office Management Assistance Program, obtaining a practice monitor, and completing the CLE program titled “Candor, Courtesy, and Confidences: Common Courtroom Conundrums.” Mr. Younglove also was ordered to pay costs and expenses of the disciplinary proceedings totaling $1,200.

Mr. Younglove’s conduct in all four counts occurred while he was employed at Lerner and Rowe Law Group representing clients in criminal matters. At one point during the relevant time period he became the supervising criminal law attorney for the firm.

In State Bar File No. 13-1767, Mr. Younglove represented a DUI defendant in Tempe Municipal Court. He failed to appear for two pretrial conferences. On the second occasion, at 6: 30 p.m. he filed a motion to continue the 8: 30 a.m. matter that he’d already missed. The basis for the motion was that he was occupied with other cases in Superior Court, matters about which he had known for several weeks. The court denied Mr. Younglove’s motion and set a $500 bond for the client to pay before it would quash an arrest warrant issued due to the client’s failure to appear at a previous matter. Mr. Younglove did not notify the client of these circumstances so when she later appeared in court on an unrelated matter with a different attorney, she was arrested.

In State Bar File No. 13-2016, Mr. Younglove represented a client in a criminal proceeding in Bullhead City Municipal Court. He was three hours late for a pretrial hearing. Upon arriving in court Mr. Younglove asked to have his client’s matter heard to avoid making another trip from Phoenix. Judge Psareas admonished Mr. Younglove for expecting the court to drop everything it was doing at 4: 50 p.m. to accommodate him. During the hearing Judge Psareas asked Mr. Younglove if he knew Tempe Judge MaryAnne Majestic, and if he thought she would hear his case under similar circumstances. Mr. Younglove told Judge Psareas that he knew Judge Majestic from his many court appearances and that because she was his golfing companion and she would be happy to hear his case under the scenario presented. Judge Majestic learned of this conversation and asked Mr. Younglove to self-report his lie to the State Bar because “ 1) you may have appeared before me but I have no recollection of you, 2) I am not your ‘golfing companion,’ and 3) I do not play golf.” Mr. Younglove did not self-report. In the discipline case Mr. Younglove acknowledged that he never appeared before Judge Majestic in person although he had cases in her court. He explained that years earlier he was once paired with a woman golfer who introduced herself as a Municipal Court judge, could not recall her name, and assumed without actually knowing that it was Judge Majestic because she was the only woman

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