Lawyer who abandoned clients for accused suspended 2 years

The Supreme Court has suspended a lawyer from legal practice for two years for abandoning clients who were counting on him to negotiate an amicable settlement with officers of a Quezon City firm engaged in a pyramiding scheme.

Voting 14-0, the high tribunal found Edgardo Era guilty of violating Rule 15.03 of Canon 15 and Canon 17 of the Code of Professional Responsibility, which penalize conflict of interest and infidelity to client’s cause.

The court, in a 10-page decision dated July 17 and posted on Friday on the judiciary website, faulted Era for leaving his client Fernando Samson and other pyramid scam victims to be the legal counsel of Emilia Sison, the main accused in the case.

“A lawyer shall not represent conflicting interests except by written consent of all concerned given after a full disclosure of the facts. Attorney Era thus owed to Samson and his group entire devotion to their genuine interest, and warm zeal in the maintenance and defense of their rights,” the high court said in a decision written by Justice Lucas Bersamin.

Aside from being suspended, Era was also warned that the commission of a similar offense “will be dealt with more severely.”

Samson said he and his relatives hired Era in 2002 to file estafa charges in the Quezon City Regional Trial Court against Sison and other officers of ICS Corp. who allegedly duped them in a pyramiding scam.

In April 2003, Samson said his group agreed to an amicable settlement negotiated by Era. Sison offered to turn over to the complainants a piece of property in Antipolo City in return for withdrawing the charges.

Samson and the other victims signed an affidavit of desistance and Era later delivered the deed of absolute sale to them.

The victims, however, learned from the Antipolo registry of deeds and assessor’s office that the lot was no longer titled to ICS. They asked Era to negotiate again with ICS but they did not hear from him for months. They wrote him in September 2004 to remind him.

When the hearings at the RTC resumed, Samson said they were shocked to learn that Era had been entering his appearance as counsel for Sison in her other criminal cases involving the pyramid scam. They also learned that Era had visited Sison in her detention cell at Camp Karingal, Quezon City.

Samson filed a disbarment complaint against Era in the Supreme Court in January 2005. Era replied only in April 2006, saying that his relationship with Samson’s group terminated with the conclusion of the compromise agreement and that it was the RTC that appointed him temporary counsel for Sison.

The high court referred the complaint to the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, whose investigating commissioner found Era guilty of misconduct for representing conflicting interests, for failing to serve his clients with competence and diligence, and for failing to champion his clients’ cause with wholehearted fidelity, care and devotion.

In October 2007, the IBP board of governors upheld the investigator’s findings and suspended Era for two years from legal practice. The board denied Era’s motion for reconsideration in June 2012 and forwarded the case to the Supreme Court.