In re Tun ( 2022 )

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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS
No. 22-BG-054
IN RE HARRY TUN, RESPONDENT.
A Suspended Member of the Bar
of the District of Columbia
(Bar Registration No. 416262)
On Report and Recommendation
of the Board on Professional Responsibility
(Bar Docket No. 2017-D215)
(Board Docket No. 19-BD-019)
(Argued October 26, 2022 Decided December 22, 2022)
Abraham C. Blitzer for respondent.
Myles V. Lynk, Senior Assistant Disciplinary Counsel, with whom Julia L.
Porter, Deputy Disciplinary Counsel, was on the brief, for the Office of Disciplinary
Counsel.
Before EASTERLY and ALIKHAN, Associate Judges, and RUIZ, Senior Judge.
ALIKHAN, Associate Judge: Considering the record before it, including
Disciplinary Counsel’s recommendations, the Ad Hoc Hearing Committee’s report,
and the respondent’s counterarguments, the D.C. Board on Professional
Responsibility concluded that Harry Tun had violated numerous Maryland Rules of
Professional Conduct by committing serious acts of repeated dishonesty. Despite
2
the Hearing Committee’s recommendation that Mr. Tun be suspended for three years
with a fitness requirement, the Board concluded that he should be disbarred.
Because Mr. Tun concedes that he violated the charged rules, and because
disbarment is within the acceptable range of outcomes for misconduct of this
magnitude, we agree with the Board’s recommendation and disbar Mr. Tun from the
practice of law in the District of Columbia. 1
I. Factual Background
A. Mr. Tun’s D.C. Bar Membership and Disciplinary History
Mr. Tun has been a member of the District of Columbia Bar since 1988. From
1993 to the present, he has received a total of five informal admonitions from the
D.C. Office of Disciplinary Counsel (formerly the Office of Bar Counsel) and two
suspensions from this court for violating various professional rules.
Mr. Tun’s disciplinary history is long, but we review it to provide an accurate
timeline of his misconduct. Mr. Tun received his first informal admonition in
November 1993 for violating D.C. R. Prof. Conduct 1.4(a) (failing to communicate
1
This court is able to discipline Mr. Tun for his violations of the Maryland
Rules of Professional Conduct because the conduct giving rise to this proceeding
had “its predominant effect in another jurisdiction in which the lawyer is also
licensed to practice.” D.C. R. Prof. Conduct 8.5(b)(2)(ii); see In re Johnson, 158
A.3d 913, 915 n.1 (D.C. 2017) (“A lawyer admitted to our bar may be disciplined
here for conduct occurring in another jurisdiction, and in appropriate cases, as here,
subject to discipline here based on the ethics rules of the other jurisdiction.”).
3
with a client) and 1.5(b) (failing to provide a client with a written fee arrangement).
He received his second in February 1995 for violating then-Rule 1.15(b) (failing to
properly transmit funds to a third party). His third came in February 2004, this time
for violating Rules 1.15(a) (failing to maintain records of a client’s settlement
agreement) and 1.16(d) (failing to provide a client’s file). He received his fourth in
October 2011 for violating Rule 1.6(a) (improperly disclosing a client’s
confidences). And his fifth and final informal admonition came in October 2013 for
violating Rule 4.3(a)(1) (improperly advising an unrepresented person despite a
potential conflict with his client’s interests).
An informal admonition is a form of discipline. See D.C. Bar R. XI, § 3(a)(5).
Each letter of admonition that Mr. Tun received specified the rules he had violated
and explained that the admonition constituted discipline pursuant to D.C. Bar R. XI,
§ 3. And even though a recipient of an informal admonition can request a formal
hearing to challenge the charges, D.C. Bar R. XI, § 8(b), Mr. Tun did not do so.
In addition to being informally admonished, Mr. Tun was suspended in both
2011 and 2018 for separate violations of the District of Columbia’s professional
rules. In 2011, he received an 18-month suspension (with six months stayed in favor
of a one-year term of probation) for filing inaccurate Criminal Justice Act vouchers
with the Superior Court of the District of Columbia between 1999 and 2003. See In
4
re Tun (Tun I), 26 A.3d 313, 314 (D.C. 2011) (per curiam). His submissions double-
billed for work he had done, resulting in $16,034 of overpaid funds. Id. Mr. Tun
and Disciplinary Counsel eventually filed a petition for negotiated discipline, which
this court accepted at the Hearing Committee’s recommendation. Id. at 314-15.
The proceedings for Tun I, however, spawned yet another disciplinary action.
In 2018, Mr. Tun was suspended for one year for lying on a motion to recuse. See
In re Tun (Tun II), 195 A.3d 65, 68-72 (D.C. 2018). The motion, which Mr. Tun
filed while the Tun I proceedings were ongoing, falsely stated that the Tun I
investigation had concluded without any disciplinary action being instituted against
him. Id. at 69-70. In an effort to avoid blame for that misconduct, Mr. Tun also
gave intentionally false testimony to the Hearing Committee during the Tun II
proceedings. Id. at 74. While the Hearing Committee and Board both recommended
a one-year suspension, only the Board recommended an additional fitness
requirement. Id. at 71-72. After reviewing comparable cases and determining that
a showing of fitness was unnecessary, we suspended Mr. Tun for one year. Id. at
79. 2
One member of the panel would have imposed a fitness requirement. Tun II,
2
195 A.3d at 79 (Glickman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part).
5
B. The Present Violations
Mr. Tun was admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court for the District
of Maryland in March 1993. He subsequently applied to renew his membership six
times: in May 1997, March 1999, March 2002, March 2005, March 2011, and
July 2017. Each application asked whether Mr. Tun had ever “been denied
admission to practice, disbarred, suspended from practice, or disciplined by any
court or bar authority.” On the first five renewal applications, he answered “no”
even though he had received one or more informal admonitions before each
application. On the sixth, which he submitted after his 2011 suspension, he
answered “yes,” disclosing the suspension but none of the informal admonitions.
The renewal application also asked whether Mr. Tun was the subject of any pending
disciplinary proceedings. To his credit, he answered “yes” to this question on his
fifth renewal application, which he submitted while Tun I was ongoing. But he
answered “no” to this question on his sixth renewal application, even though he was
in the middle of the proceedings that would ultimately result in his second
suspension. In each application, Mr. Tun “declare[d]” or “certif[ied]” under penalty
of perjury that his responses were true.
In August 2017, Mr. Tun wrote a letter to the district court admitting that his
answer to the pending discipline question in his sixth renewal application was false.
Mr. Tun claimed that he had believed that the question only referred to disciplinary
6
actions pending in Maryland, despite having reported the pending District of
Columbia disciplinary proceeding in his fifth renewal application.
II. Procedural History
After receiving Mr. Tun’s letter, a district court employee informed the D.C.
Office of Disciplinary Counsel about the false statements in Mr. Tun’s sixth renewal
application, and Disciplinary Counsel opened an investigation. In March 2019,
Disciplinary Counsel served Mr. Tun with a specification of charges related to his
false statements on all six renewal applications, alleging violations of Maryland
Rules of Professional Conduct 19-303.3(a)(1) (knowingly making a false statement
of fact or law to a tribunal), 19-308.4(b) (committing a criminal act reflecting
adversely on the attorney’s honesty, trustworthiness, or fitness as an attorney),
19-308.4(c) (engaging in conduct involving dishonesty), and 19-308.4(d) (engaging
in conduct that seriously interferes with the administration of justice). Mr. Tun filed
an answer admitting to essentially all of the specification’s factual allegations. After
briefing, both parties presented arguments and testimony before an Ad Hoc Hearing
Committee.
At the hearing, Mr. Tun initially claimed that he had not fully understood that
informal admonitions were a form of discipline when he submitted his renewal
applications. He also claimed that he had not thought it necessary to report District
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of Columbia disciplinary proceedings in his renewal applications in Maryland
federal court, repeating his explanation from the 2017 letter. Later in the hearing,
however, Mr. Tun admitted that he had understood the informal admonitions to be
forms of discipline and that he had “made a mistake” by omitting them from the
applications.
In his post-hearing briefing, Mr. Tun conceded that his failure to report the
pending disciplinary matter in his sixth renewal application constituted perjury and
violated Maryland Rules 19-303.3(a)(1) and 19-308.4(b) to (d). But, somewhat
contradicting his hearing testimony, he again claimed ignorance about the true
disciplinary nature of his informal admonitions and argued that those omissions were
not perjurious. As to an appropriate sanction, Mr. Tun contended that he should only
be suspended for one year. Disciplinary Counsel, in contrast, recommended
disbarment.
Upon consideration of the evidence and briefing, the Hearing Committee
concluded that Mr. Tun had been fully aware of each informal admonition and had
known that each constituted discipline. It also determined that he had given
intentionally false testimony at the hearing in attempting to explain why he had
omitted them. With respect to Mr. Tun’s failure to disclose his ongoing disciplinary
proceeding in his sixth renewal application, the Committee found that he had
8
committed perjury in violation of both federal and Maryland law. It also found that
he had given intentionally false testimony at the hearing by claiming that he did not
know that he needed to report District of Columbia discipline to the Maryland federal
court.
The Hearing Committee ultimately concluded that Mr. Tun had violated all of
the charged rules and recommended that he be suspended from the practice of law
for three years. It did not recommend a fitness requirement, however, explaining
that it could “envisage no fitness requirements, probation conditions, or CLE courses
that [would] correct [Mr. Tun]’s disregard for the truth when he is confronted with
a court submission in the future.”
Before the Board, neither party took exceptions to the Hearing Committee’s
factual findings, but both parties lodged exceptions to its sanctions recommendation.
Disciplinary Counsel continued to assert that disbarment was appropriate, while
Mr. Tun advocated for an 18-month suspension without a fitness requirement.
Mr. Tun also took exception to the conclusion that he had given intentionally false
testimony at the hearing concerning his state of mind when he filed the renewal
applications.
Given Mr. Tun’s limited exceptions, the Board determined that he was not
disputing the Hearing Committee’s conclusion that he had violated the charged rules.
9
As a result, the Board’s report was almost exclusively limited to the appropriate
sanction. Departing from the Hearing Committee’s recommendation and agreeing
with Disciplinary Counsel, the Board recommended disbarment. The Board’s
reasoning was four-fold. First, the Board explained that Mr. Tun’s protracted
dishonesty over the course of more than 20 years strongly favored a sanction harsher
than suspension. Second, it noted that Mr. Tun had previously been disciplined for
dishonest conduct, but the sanctions in those cases had not deterred him from
continued dishonesty. Third, the Board determined that aggravating factors
significantly outweighed any mitigating ones. 3 Fourth and finally, the Board
reviewed comparable cases and distinguished those that the Hearing Committee had
cited in favor of a three-year suspension as being “not sufficiently comparable . . .
because they d[id] not involve the protracted dishonesty found here.”
3
In its analysis of this third consideration, the Board addressed Mr. Tun’s
exception to the Committee’s determination that he had given intentionally false
testimony at the hearing. The Board concluded that Mr. Tun had not intentionally
lied to the Committee but instead had given “ineffectual explanations as to why he
thought he could lie on the renewal forms.” Even so, this was not exculpatory. The
Board found that his testimony actually established—perhaps more
disconcertingly—that he was capable of internally justifying his own dishonesty.
10
Disciplinary Counsel did not take exception to the Board’s recommendation,
but Mr. Tun submitted a one-paragraph letter of exception and subsequently filed a
brief in this court. 4
III. Discussion
Mr. Tun has conceded that he violated each of the charged rules, and we
conclude that the Hearing Committee’s and Board’s findings on this front are
supported by substantial evidence. D.C. Bar R. XI, § 9(h)(1) (providing that this
court “shall accept the findings of fact made by the Board unless they are
unsupported by substantial evidence of record”). Therefore, the only issue before us
on appeal is the appropriate sanction. The Board contends—and Disciplinary
Counsel agrees—that disbarment is necessary. Mr. Tun instead advocates for a two-
year suspension without a fitness requirement. We agree with the Board.
A. Standard of Review
“The Board’s recommended sanction ‘comes to us with a strong presumption
in favor of its imposition.’” In re McClure, 144 A.3d 570, 572 (D.C. 2016)
(per curiam) (quoting In re Baber, 106 A.3d 1072, 1076 (D.C. 2015) (per curiam)).
4
Mr. Tun’s letter did not provide a clear basis for his exception and merely
stated: “Please be advised that Respondent Harry Tun hereby notes his exception to
the report and recommendation filed by the Board on Professional Responsibility on
February[ ]2, 2022, in this matter.”
11
We “shall adopt the recommended disposition of the Board unless to do so would
foster a tendency toward inconsistent dispositions for comparable conduct or would
otherwise be unwarranted.” D.C. Bar R. XI, § 9(h)(1). And although we are
evaluating misconduct under the rules of another jurisdiction, we make sanctions
determinations pursuant to District of Columbia law. See, e.g., In re Ponds, 888
A.2d 234, 240-45 (D.C. 2005) (applying District law in a case where the respondent
was charged with violating the Maryland Rules of Professional Conduct).
B. Sanctions Factors
When determining the appropriate disciplinary sanction, we evaluate “(1) the
seriousness of the conduct, (2) [any] prejudice to the client, (3) whether the conduct
involved dishonesty, (4) violation of other disciplinary rules, (5) the attorney’s
disciplinary history, (6) whether the attorney has acknowledged his or her wrongful
conduct, and (7) mitigating circumstances.” In re Martin, 67 A.3d 1032, 1053
(D.C. 2013).
In light of the Board’s thorough analysis of the sanctions factors—and the
lack of any meaningful challenge to it from Mr. Tun—we forgo an in-depth
discussion of the topic here. In brief, we agree with the Board that the sanctions
factors weigh heavily in favor of a harsher sanction given the serious nature of the
misconduct, which involved more than 20 years of repetitive, dishonest behavior.
12
We also note that this is Mr. Tun’s third visit to our court for violating our
rules of professional conduct (and his eighth time being subject to discipline in our
jurisdiction). Both of his prior suspensions involved dishonest conduct, and his 2018
suspension was for precisely the same type of dishonest behavior at issue here:
making false statements to a court. See Tun II, 195 A.3d at 74 (“This case involves
respondent’s dishonesty to the court in [a] recusal motion[.]”). Making matters
worse, his statements before the Hearing Committee in Tun II were found to have
been “intentionally false.” Id.
Mr. Tun’s disciplinary history demonstrates a clear disregard for the candor
we expect from all members of our bar. He has repeatedly exhibited an inability to
learn from his mistakes or correct his behavior, even after facing discipline. As one
member of our court observed in Tun II, “[w]arnings and chastisements failed to
impress [Mr. Tun] with the need to conform to ethical standards of practice.” Id. at
80 (Glickman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). We do not take
Mr. Tun’s long record of rule violations lightly, and that record greatly influences
our decision today.
C. Comparable Cases
Turning to an analysis of comparable cases, we review our disciplinary
precedents and will adopt the Board’s recommended sanction as long as it “falls
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within [a] wide range of acceptable outcomes.” In re Martin, 67 A.3d at 1053.
Mr. Tun cites only two cases in support of his argument for a lesser sanction, but
neither counsels in favor of a more lenient outcome.
In the first case, In re Silva, 29 A.3d 924 (D.C. 2011), we imposed a three-
year suspension with a fitness requirement on an attorney who had forged an
easement agreement between his client and several adjacent property owners and
then lied to his client about the forgery. Id. at 925. During the disciplinary
proceedings, the attorney acknowledged his wrongdoing but blamed it on his
struggles with substance addiction and “other personal problems.” Id. at 926. The
Hearing Committee recommended disbarment, but the Board recommended a three-
year suspension with a fitness requirement. 5 Id. On appeal, we adopted the Board’s
recommendation. Id. at 929.
While In re Silva involved dishonest conduct, that case differs from Mr. Tun’s
in several significant ways. First, Mr. Silva’s dishonesty was largely confined to a
5
While a three-year suspension with a fitness requirement seems far less
drastic than outright disbarment (which requires that the disbarred attorney wait at
least five years before seeking readmission), we note that a demonstration of fitness
is an onerous—and sometimes insurmountable—obstacle to overcome. See In re
Cater, 887 A.2d 1, 25 (D.C. 2005) (“[W]hile a fitness requirement is not quite as
severe an enhancement as disbarment, it comes close; as we have explained, it can
transform a thirty-day suspension into one that lasts for years.”). The two sanctions
are thus more practically similar than their names might suggest.
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single transaction of forgery and its accompanying misrepresentations. See id. at
925. It did not involve multiple, separate incidents of dishonesty over the course of
nearly two decades. Second, we gave significant weight to the Board’s
recommendation as a starting point for our analysis in that case. See id. at 926 (“We
think a strong enough case for rejecting the Board’s recommendation has not been
made.”). Here, the Board’s recommendation is disbarment and, under In re Silva,
we give it great weight.
In the second case Mr. Tun cites, In re Slaughter, 929 A.2d 433 (D.C. 2007),
we also suspended the attorney for three years with a fitness requirement after he
engaged in a series of lies (first through forgeries and subsequently through false
statements to his law firm and others) mischaracterizing the nature of an attorney-
client relationship. Id. at 437-39. Both the Hearing Committee and the Board
recommended a three-year suspension with a fitness requirement. Id. at 440. On
appeal, we adopted that recommendation. Id. at 448.
Certain language from In re Slaughter, like the opinion’s references to
Mr. Slaughter’s “repeated acts of dishonesty,” paints the case in a similar light to the
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present one. Id. at 447. But on the whole, In re Slaughter does not help Mr. Tun.
Crucially, we explained:
Were it not for our deferential standard of review with
respect to the Board’s recommendation, we would have no
hesitation in ordering disbarment. We note, however, that
Bar Counsel has filed no exception to the Board’s report
and recommendation and characterizes the Board’s
proposed sanction as “warranted and not inconsistent with
dispositions in comparable cases.” We have recently
recognized that . . . [the] imposition of a sanction more
severe than that recommended by Bar Counsel should be
the infrequent exception rather than the rule. We,
therefore, have decided to adopt the Board’s
recommendation, which falls within, though on the lenient
side of, the appropriate range in this area.
Id. at 447 n.9 (emphases added). We could not have been clearer in the above-quoted
language that we would have disbarred Mr. Slaughter if the Board had recommended
it. Here, in contrast, the Board contends that disbarment is appropriate. Therefore,
as with In re Silva, the rationale behind imposing a lesser sanction in In re Slaughter
works in reverse here and actually militates in favor of a more severe sanction.
Two additional points distinguish the present case from In re Silva and In re
Slaughter. First, neither respondent had disciplinary histories comparable to
Mr. Tun’s five informal admonitions and two suspensions. See In re Silva, 29 A.3d
at 943 (noting, in the Board’s report and recommendation, that Mr. Silva had no
prior discipline in the District and only one instance of discipline in Virginia); In re
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Slaughter, 929 A.2d at 447 (noting Mr. Slaughter’s lack of disciplinary history).
Second, neither In re Silva nor In re Slaughter involved dishonesty directed at a
tribunal, something we have repeatedly called “an extremely serious ethical
violation.” See, e.g., In re Johnson, 275 A.3d 268, 277 (D.C. 2022) (per curiam)
(quoting In re Ukwu, 926 A.2d 1106, 1140 (D.C. 2007)). An attorney’s lack of
candor with a judicial tribunal, especially under the penalty of perjury, casts serious
doubt on his fitness to practice law. Accordingly, In re Silva and In re Slaughter do
not persuade us to give Mr. Tun a more lenient sanction. 6
On the opposite end of the spectrum, two cases in particular support disbarring
Mr. Tun. The first, In re Corizzi, 803 A.2d 438 (D.C. 2002), involved an attorney
who had instructed two clients to give false deposition testimony and then lied to the
6
We also briefly address the trio of cases the Hearing Committee relied on in
support of a three-year suspension. None of those cases featured misconduct
comparable to the protracted dishonesty present here, and in each case we merely
adopted the Board’s unchallenged recommendation. See In re Rohde, 234 A.3d
1203, 1203 (D.C. 2020) (per curiam) (adopting the Board’s recommended sanction
of a public censure for a single instance of dishonesty where neither party took
exception to that recommendation); In re Adkins, 219 A.3d 524, 524 (D.C. 2019)
(per curiam) (adopting the Board’s recommended sanction of a three-year
suspension with a fitness requirement for concealing a hit-and-run conviction and
other misrepresentations on a single application where neither party took exception
to that recommendation); In re Small, 760 A.2d 612, 613 n.1, 614 (D.C. 2000) (per
curiam) (adopting the Board’s recommended sanction of a three-year suspension
with a fitness requirement for failing to update a D.C. Bar admission application
where neither party took exception to that recommendation).
17
court and opposing counsel about his attorney-client relationship with a third client.
Id. at 440-41. Both the Hearing Committee and Board found that Mr. Corizzi had
violated D.C. R. Prof. Conduct 3.3(a), 3.4(b), and 8.4(c) (analogues to two of the
Maryland rules Mr. Tun violated here) by suborning the perjury of his clients and
recommended that he be disbarred. In re Corizzi, 803 A.2d at 440-41. On appeal,
we adopted that recommendation. Id. at 443.
In our decision, we explained that “perjury and perjury-related offenses
involve moral turpitude per se.” Id. at 442. Under District of Columbia law, formal
convictions for crimes of moral turpitude mandate disbarment. See D.C. Code
§ 11-2503(a) (“When a member of the bar of the District of Columbia Court of
Appeals is convicted of an offense involving moral turpitude, . . . the name of the
member of the bar so convicted shall be struck from the roll of the members of the
bar and such person shall thereafter cease to be a member.”). We clarified, however,
that a “lawyer need not actually be convicted of a crime of moral turpitude in order
to be disbarred on the basis of the underlying conduct.” In re Corizzi, 803 A.2d at
442 (emphasis added). The fact that Mr. Corizzi was never criminally charged and
convicted did not save him from disbarment. Id. at 443; see In re Slattery, 767 A.2d
203, 207 (D.C. 2001) (“[A]n attorney is not immune from bar discipline under
Rule 8.4 merely because a complainant or prosecuting authority has chosen not to
bring criminal charges. Rather, an attorney may be disciplined for having engaged
18
in . . . dishonest or deceitful conduct, despite not having been prosecuted for such
actions.”). Here, both the Hearing Committee and the Board determined that
Mr. Tun had perjured himself by submitting knowingly false renewal applications
in violation of both federal and state law (a point he conceded, at least with respect
to his omission of pending discipline in his sixth renewal application). Had he been
criminally charged with and convicted of perjury, there would be nothing to discuss.
See In re Daum, 69 A.3d 400, 401 (D.C. 2013) (per curiam) (holding that a perjury
conviction mandates disbarment under District law). The mere fortuity that Mr. Tun
was not criminally prosecuted for his misconduct does not dissuade us from
imposing a harsher sanction. And while it is true that our role differs from that of
the criminal justice system, our duty to protect the public and the integrity of our bar
drives us to take action even when law enforcement does not.
The second case is In re Baber, 106 A.3d 1072 (D.C. 2015) (per curiam),
where we held that a pattern of dishonest conduct over the course of multiple years
warranted disbarment. Id. at 1077. Mr. Baber had represented a client in a probate
matter despite knowing little about probate law, lied to his client and the court about
various deadlines and filings, and then later sued his client to recover arbitrary fees
while making numerous misrepresentations in the process. Id. at 1073-75. Agreeing
with Disciplinary Counsel, the Hearing Committee determined that Mr. Baber had
committed “flagrant dishonesty” in violating several rules, including D.C. R. Prof.
19
Conduct 3.3 and 8.4, and recommended disbarment. In re Baber, 106 A.3d at 1075.
The Board, however, recommended a three-year suspension in light of Mr. Baber’s
lack of disciplinary history and the fact that his conduct was largely limited to a
single representation. Id. at 1075-76. On appeal, we departed from the Board’s
recommendation and disbarred Mr. Baber. Id. at 1077.
In our ruling, we emphasized the fundamental principle that “honesty is basic
to the practice of law, and that lawyers have a greater duty than ordinary citizens to
be scrupulously honest at all times.” Id. And while a single lie certainly does not
warrant our harshest sanction, we concluded that disbarment was appropriate given
that “th[e] case involve[d] a series of knowingly false statements, not only to [the
client] but also . . . in written pleadings filed in court.” Id. (emphasis added). In
other words, it was the “repeated and protracted nature of Mr. Baber’s dishonesty”
that tipped the scales in favor of disbarment. Id.; see In re O’Neill, 276 A.3d 492,
503 (D.C. 2022) (“[F]lagrant dishonesty provide[s] an independent basis
for . . . disbarment.”).
The lessons from these two cases inform our decision today. While Mr. Tun’s
behavior did not involve the type of dishonesty to clients present in In re Corizzi or
In re Baber, the protracted and persistent nature of his misconduct, coupled with our
deference to the Board, warrants disbarment. Attorneys simply cannot be trusted to
20
fulfill their duties to the judicial system and to the public if they flout their duty to
be truthful. See, e.g., In re O’Neill, 276 A.3d at 503 (explaining that a “continuing
and pervasive indifference to the obligations of honesty in the judicial system”
warrants disbarment). Mr. Tun has failed to respect that obligation again and again,
leading the Hearing Committee to observe that it could “envisage no fitness
requirements, probation conditions, or CLE courses that [would] correct [his]
disregard for the truth.” We agree and hereby revoke his membership in our bar.
IV. Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, Harry Tun is disbarred from the practice of law in
the District of Columbia. For purposes of reinstatement, the effective date of his
disbarment will not begin to run until he files an affidavit that complies with D.C.
Bar Rule XI, § 14(g).
So ordered.