In the dog-eat-dog world of the legal profession, Christian Coomer would be considered a purebred and Johnbull Nwosu a mutt.
Coomer is a former Republican majority whip in the state House and a U.S. Air Force judge advocate who capped his career on the bench of the Court of Appeals of Georgia.
Nwosu, a Nigerian immigrant, worked 20 years as a Division of Family and Children Services caseworker while attending law school at night, took the bar exam three times before passing and for the past decade has scraped around the legal profession trying to make a living.
Until last week, that is, when the state Supreme Court disbarred Nwosu for altering the date on a legal document in a civil case about a business dispute.
Coomer is now a defrocked judge who was removed from the appeals court after being caught “hoodwinking” an elderly client.
Before he was appointed judge in 2018, Coomer had his client loan him $370,000 in unsecured loans, one whose repayment terms stretched out until the old fellow would have turned 106.
Coomer also drew up a will designating himself as executor, trustee and beneficiary. He removed himself from those roles after his judicial appointment — and installed his wife.
Despite all that, Coomer will regain his law license in August after receiving a friends and family deal from the same Supreme Court that terminated Nwosu’s career.
Credit: Courtesy
Credit: Courtesy
Last year, the Supremes suspended Coomer’s law license for two years. But it really was a nine-month suspension because the court backdated his “punishment” giving him credit for not practicing law after he was removed from the appeals court in August 2023.
All wasn’t lost for Coomer. He “earned” about $600,000 in salary and benefits from the taxpayers between 2020 and 2023 while on leave from the bench as he fought to save his judging gig.
So, why pick on Coomer now? He’s got nothing to do with Nwosu’s mess, right?
Well, Lester Tate, who is Nwosu’s attorney, says Coomer’s fate has everything to do with his client. Tate repeatedly brought up Coomer’s case in a legal filing before the Supreme Court, which makes the final decision on wayward lawyers’ punishments.
He reminded the justices, who last year gave Coomer an administrative hug, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. (Or something like that. Tate, who represents lots of troubled lawyers and judges, likes to exude a country lawyer aura.)
“It defies rational understanding how a disgraced ex-appellate judge who admitted to hoodwinking an elderly client for profit for years prior to taking the bench was administered a two-year suspension,” Tate wrote, adding, “while (Nwosu) who made an admittedly critical but negligent mistake and has significant evidence of mitigating factors is slated to be disbarred.”
In essence, Tate was trying to shame the justices: If Coomer can get away with what he did and still practice law, then you should think hard when deciding to strip away other lawyers’ livelihoods.
Especially those who sinned less egregiously.
Justice is moored in precedent, the aim of which is to instill even standards for how misdeeds are punished. Tate was using Coomer’s conduct — and resulting punishment — as a yardstick to measure misconduct.
Is that half a Coomer? Or three-quarters a Coomer?
Tate has labeled his client changing the date in a court document a “mistake.” The special master, the lawyer brought in to hear the case before it went to the Supreme Court, said Nwosu knowingly changed the date on the document and believed he did so to deceive the court.
So, that would make it more of an “on purpose,” not a mistake. And doctoring evidence is not good at all.
Henry County Judge Vincent A. Lotti, who heard the case that led to Nwosu’s trouble, reported him to the Georgia State Bar. But Lotti later testified in a hearing that Nwosu’s action might have been a mistake — albeit a very stupid one.
“The way he was acting led me to believe that it was just — and I don’t know how to say this gently — him being incompetent. But not so much malicious,” Lotti said, adding: “The fact that he just could not understand how egregious his behavior was, led me to think that it wasn’t intentional.”
Nwosu’s lawyer argued “inexperience” was his downfall.
The disbarment case against Nwosu shows this is his first disciplinary action.
The special master found “mitigating factors” for Nwosu, saying he “acted without a selfish motive and had a good character and a good reputation.”
Coomer also had supporters, including several old Gold Dome chums, who came to his defense. They, too, swore he is a man of character who’d been misconstrued. And that he has, of course, learned a lesson.
Coomer did not get back to me. And the Supreme Court responded with the old our opinion speaks for itself.
The Supreme Court noted the State Bar’s investigation found:
- Coomer “acted with a dishonest and selfish motive.”
- His actions were “intentional acts by a lawyer with substantial experience.”
- It was “abundantly clear” Coomer “preyed upon his trust and took advantage” of an elderly man, who was lonesome, depressed and “vulnerable.”
- “That his actions involved pattern of misconduct rather than a single, isolated incident since Coomer wrote and rewrote (his client’s) wills and received three favorable loans” from him.
We are a society that embraces second chances.
Guess who will be practicing law this fall? And who won’t?
Sometimes justice is blind. And just plain wrong.
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