License of Fairfield attorney Ed Noyes suspended 30 days

FAIRFIELD - Fairfield attorney Ed Noyes will have his law license suspended for 30 days after the Iowa Supreme Court ruled he violated the Iowa Rules of Professional Conduct.

The Iowa Supreme Court handed down its ruling Friday, Dec. 13, in the case of Iowa Supreme Court Attorney Disciplinary Board v. Edward Noyes. The Iowa Supreme Court Grievance Commission heard the case originally, and recommended Noyes's license to practice law be suspended for 60 days. On appeal, the Supreme Court upheld the suspension but considered mitigating factors that caused them to cut the suspension length in half to 30 days.

The rule violations Noyes was accused of pertain to bookkeeping and the distribution of funds from his client trust account (CTA). The supreme court acknowledged that none of the violations led to clients losing money, and that none of them were done by Noyes for personal gain, reasons that figured in the court's decision to reduce Noyes's suspension to 30 days.

Noyes has been publicly reprimanded four times previously for violations of the rules of professional conduct, occurring in 1998, 2012, 2014 and 2016. The incident in 2014 arose out of Noyes's failure to provide a client with a contemporaneous written accounting of services. The one in 2016 related to Noyes failing to adequately supervise a non-lawyer intern. The similarity between those earlier cases and this most recent case prompted the commission to recommend Noyes's license be suspended.

According to the court's written opinion, an auditor for the Iowa Supreme Court Client Security Commission audited Noyes's CTA in September 2015. The audit found that four clients had negative trust account balances totaling over $4,000. Furthermore, Noyes had not reimbursed the CTA for bank fees he paid when he received client funds by credit card payment. Lastly, Noyes could not identify the clients associated with some CTA disbursements totaling about $3,800.

The written opinion states that, within five days of the audit results, Noyes had reimbursed the CTAs with earned fees that were still in the overall account, and that no clients suffered personal loss.

At the time of the audit, Noyes's firm used QuickBooks accounting software. Noyes admitted that he had, according to the court, 'no experience in QuickBooks software and relied upon [his] office manager” and a consultant. After the audit, the office manager revealed she did not fully understand how to use QuickBooks, but had been afraid to tell anyone at the firm about her struggles.

The Union contacted Noyes for a comment on his suspended license. Noyes spoke about a few of the cases where the disciplinary board noted a violation.

'In one case, a needy client was advanced funds, after his settlement agreement had been reached, but several days before the arrival of the settlement proceeds,” Noyes said. 'This was considered ‘providing financial assistance to a client,' which is prohibited.”

'In another case, a deficiency existed after our office had written a check for property taxes for a client before a real estate closing, had billed the client for this, but had not received that amount back from the client,” Noyes continued. 'This led to a deficiency in his individual account.”

The disciplinary board charged Noyes with failing to maintain complete records of his client trust account. The court's opinion states, 'Noyes largely concedes he failed to maintain his CTA and records of his CTA in accord with the rules, but he argues he should not be held responsible” for the office manager's accounting errors. The court disagreed with Noyes, arguing that Noyes cannot delegate management and supervision responsibilities to a third person 'and then wash his hands of rule violations.”

When asked to comment on the matter, Noyes remarked, 'Despite having paid a professional to ensure accuracy within the accounts, I admit I failed to properly oversee this accounting, which I was personally responsible for. The bar association takes seriously the protection of client trust account matters, which is a very good thing.”