Court Tells State Bar to Look Into Whether Discrimination Contributed To Black Lawyer's Disbarment
California’s Supreme Court has told the state bar, for the second time, to consider whether discrimination played a role in its decision to disbar a Black lawyer . In Harper on Discipline, six justices this week granted former El Cerrito solo practitioner Gregory Harper’s petition to review “whether the state bar’s facially neutral disciplinary practices … had the effect of discriminating against Harper on the issue of race.” A California attorney who was disbarred two years ago when a state bar judge believed he practiced while suffering from bipolar disorder has been given an evidentiary hearing to determine whether his disbarment was discriminatory, the court concluded Friday. The California Supreme Court pointed to a 2019 study commissioned by the state bar that found Black men have historically been placed on probation and disbarred at rates three to four times higher than white men. Justices Allison H. Eid, Leondra R. Kruger, Ming W. Chin and Mariano-Florentine Cuéllar issued th...