Decision record
Antonnette Haughton Cardenas
Allegation / charges
Deferred (Decision Pending Attorney Response) | Disciplinary Committee decision delivered April 01, 2008. View PDF DECISION OF THE DISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE OF THE GENERAL LEGAL COUNCIL COMPLAINT No. 167/2003 IN THE MATTER of a complaint by Joseph Terrelonge against Antoinette …
Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision
Complainant Joseph Terrelonge left accident-claim documents at attorney Antoinette Haughton-Cardenas's office around 2000. He was told a letter would be written and fees only payable if the matter was not settled. No suit was filed, no demand letter written, documents were not returned, and the claim became statute-barred. The Committee accepted the complainant as a witness of truth and found the attorney acted with inexcusable and deplorable negligence contrary to Canon IV(s), holding that even absent a client-lawyer contract, retaining the documents imposed a duty to either contact the client or preserve the cause of action. No dishonesty was found. The Committee deferred sentencing to allow the attorney to make submissions on punishment.
Duties found breached:
Aggravating factors:
- The client was deprived of a potential remedy by default; his cause of action became statute-barred
- Attorney retained the client's documents and did nothing as the limitation period approached
Mitigating factors:
- Attorney stated many people leave documents and there would be an administrative cost to return them (considered only partially mitigating)
Duties engaged
Other decisions involving this respondent
- 2 of 2006
- 63 of 2009
- 66 of 2009
- 3 of 2010
- 49 of 2008
- 63 of 2009
- 131 of 2007
- 41 of 2007
- 45 of 2008
- 82 of 2006
Matched by respondent name — may include a different person with the same name.
Documents
Source: https://www.generallegalcouncil.org/judgement/antonnette-haughton-cardenas-complaint-no-167-of-2003/