When personal bankruptcy attorneys are retained, their responsibility includes informing the client of the law, drafting the Petition and Schedules, filing the documents with the Court, and attending the Creditor’s Meeting, or §341 Meeting. In a recent case handed down by the United States Bankruptcy Court, a Boston attorney failed to appear at the Creditor’s Meeting for five different clients.
In fact, he sent his legal assistant, who was not an attorney. “The debtors [clients] were right to be indignant,” the Court stated. “The 341 Meeting is most often a debtor’s first exposure to the public face of the bankruptcy process and to the adversarial forces potentially arrayed against her…[the attorney] abandoned his clients at the moment they needed him most.” In addition, this attorney was aiding his assistant in what is called “unauthorized practice of the law” which is against both federal and state rules.
The case, In Re: Otero, Heather M. et al, was decided by Judge Hoffman on June 18, 2010.