The Iowa Supreme Court’s Attorney Disciplinary Board and the Grievance Commision handle ethics complaints filed against Iowa lawyers. (Photo via Canva; seal courtesy of the Iowa Supreme Court)
An Iowa judge has expressed concern with a Keokuk lawyer’s ability to practice law without damaging his clients’ interests.
In April, the Iowa Supreme Court suspended the law license of attorney Steven J. Swan due to an alleged failure by Swan to comply with the Client Security Commission’s 2023 request for information on his handling of client trust accounts.
In June, Swan filed a request for reinstatement and a hearing on the matter is now scheduled for Oct. 8.
Last month, Myron Gookin, chief judge of Iowa’s 8th Judicial District, sent the clerk of the Iowa Supreme Court a letter in which he stated that he had asked all of the judges in the Keokuk area whether they had any opinions to share regarding Swan’s efforts to have his license reinstated.
According to Gookin, two judges emailed him responses and a third spoke to him on the phone. In his letter to the clerk, Gookin didn’t identify any of the three judges by name, and he declined to do so when contacted Tuesday by the Iowa Capital Dispatch.
Gookin reported to the clerk that one of the judges who sent him a written response to his inquiry had stated that “Swan’s health has been compromised for years. In the recent past, he has regularly missed court or had to have cases reset because of his physical limitations and conditions.”
For years, Steve’s work product has been poor. He rarely, in my experience, does his work the correct way the first time.
– Iowa judge’s opinion of Keokuk attorney Steven J. Swan
According to Gookin, the judge went on to say he did not believe Swan “has the physical ability to practice law full time any longer. His physical conditions limit his ability to work long hours, to perform at a high level, to regularly meet with court-appearance requirements and to effectively communicate with his clients. For years, Steve’s work product has been poor. He rarely, in my experience, does his work the correct way the first time. Some errors are innocuous, others not so … As hard as it is to say, I do not feel he is fit to practice law fulltime.”
That same judge allegedly sent Gookin a second email in which he or she stated: “I tried the custody case that occurred just days after he was suspended this last time, and I was upset by that whole affair… He did virtually nothing, so far as I could tell, to timely cure issues with his trust account so that his client could be represented at the custody case. He had weeks, if not longer, to correct the trust account problems and failed to do so.”
Judge supports license reinstatement
The second judge who wrote to Gookin reportedly stated he considered Swan a friend and felt that Swan was “a capable lawyer when he is healthy. He has been battling some serious health problems for many years. I would like to see him have another chance. Therefore, I support his application for reinstatement.”
Gookin wrote that the third judge who weighed in on the matter had said that he’d presided over two cases that raised concerns with regard to Swan. In one case, the judge reportedly said, Swan appeared not to have informed his clients that that his law license had been suspended, resulting in the clients showing up for court while under the impression Swan would be representing them. In the other case, a party to the proceeding complained that Swan had failed to communicate with them on an issue of some kind.
District Judge Clinton Boddicker also wrote directly to the clerk of the Iowa Supreme Court and voiced his support for Swan in language that was similar, and in some cases identical, to that of the second judge who had emailed his thoughts to Gookin.
In his letter to the clerk, Boddicker described Swan as a “colleague and a friend” who is “a capable lawyer when healthy. He has battled serious health problems for the last several years. Sometimes this has impeded his ability to stay on top of his practice. I can state with some certainty that Mr. Swan would never purposefully neglect his clients or cases.”
Boddicker went on to write that he “would like to see Mr. Swan given another chance to show that he can competently handle his cases and stay on top of his reporting requirements. Lee County in general, and Keokuk specifically, suffers from a lack of lawyers to serve its population.”
Sexual harassment complaint leads to reprimand
In 2012, Swan was issued a public reprimand for failing to communicate with a client about the status of her divorce case.
In August 2023, Swan’s license was suspended for one month due to an alleged failure to provide requested trust-account information to the state’s Client Security Commission.
In May of this year, Swan was reprimanded for his handling of two court matters. In one of those cases, a client’s appeal of a court decision was allegedly dismissed due to Swan’s failure to comply with court rules and deadlines.
In the second matter, a woman complained that after Swan represented her and her husband in a joint bankruptcy, he then represented the husband in the couple’s divorce proceedings and harassed her on social media.
In that matter, the Iowa Attorney Disciplinary Board concluded that Swan had violated rules pertaining to conflicts of interest, and also violated rules concerning sexual harassment by posting to social media a “sexually suggestive” message in which he “compared a scantily clad woman to a grenade.”
The April suspension of Swan’s license, which stems from the recurring issue with the Client Security Commission seeking information on Swan’s client trust accounts, currently remains in effect.
Swan did not immediately respond to messages left with his office staff.