Negligencia Legal

The Nevada Supreme Court has issued an order temporarily suspending the license of Las Vegas bankruptcy attorney Jorge Sanchez, who abruptly shut down his office leaving approximately 400 cases unresolved. Here's a little background from his website:

Jorge L. Sanchez

· Practice Areas: Bankruptcy, Foreclosure Defense, Creditor Harassment

· Law School: Michigan State University – Cum Laude

· College: University of Nevada, Las Vegas

· Member: Nevada and Minnesota, United States District Court for the District of Nevada, National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys, Clark County Bar Association, Latino Bar Association, National Association of Consumer Advocates

· Languages: Fluent Spanish

Cum Laude at Michigan State and a member of two bars? Very impressive, Mr. Sanchez, we're sure you'll make a fine attorney. Oh, wait. From the RJ:

The petition said Sanchez has filed 669 cases in Bankruptcy Court since August 2008 and is still listed as the counsel of record in at least 400 of them.

Sanchez acknowledged in the petition that he received a retainer of $1,500 to $2,500 for each of his cases but no longer has any of that money to refund to his clients.

Let's see: 669 * ($1,500 + $2,500)/2 = $1,338,000. Oh, we're sorry, Jorge. That fails the WWL bright-line rule for permanent disbarment. Thanks for playing, please leave your law license at the door. In your next life, be sure to steal less than your total law school tuition.

The Supremes also seem to have come up with a too-little, too-late solution for Jorge's clients:

The Supreme Court ordered that a trust account be set up to hold any future funds from Sanchez's clients and that he not be given access to that money.

Future funds from clients? Oh, they must mean from all those new clients he'll be taking on during his suspension. Got it.

(LVRJ; Thanks, Tipsters!)

Golightly & Assoc. v. Frank Sorentino (Round Two)--ends 7/16 at 5 pm

Today, it's the Man Who Never Blinks (Chad Golightly) v. the Man Who Never Ages (Frank Sorrentino)

In his first round match, Golightly stared down the competition, taking in 61% of the vote (background on G&A and first round results found here). Meanwhile, Mr. Sorrentino outlasted his last opponent and pulled in 68% of the vote (background on Frank Sorrentino and first round results found here). Voting ends on July 16 at 5 p.m.

Randolph Goldberg v. Frank Sorrentino (Round 1 of the Tournament of Billboard/Television Vegas Law Firms

The Round One match ups continue. Today's offering: Randolph Goldberg v. Frank Sorrentino (Voting will be open until 5 p.m. on Tues., 6/30).

Let's meet the contenders:

Randolph Goldberg

Randy recently got into a bit of a pickle with bankruptcy judge Bruce A. Markell, getting himself sanctioned. One such sanction forced Goldberg to provide clients with copies of BAM's opinion about his ethical shortcomings.

There is no doubt, however, that Goldberg is a "commercial personality." Any television viewer sans Tivo can attest to that. What is more fascinating about Goldberg is the fact that he doesn't have a website, instead choosing to have his firm listed on various "Yellow Page" type websites (see here here here) where readers and past clients can leave comments about his quality of service. Even better, Goldberg responds to the comments personally. Here's one of our favorites:

Response from this business:

LIAR Posted at: 06/26/09
MS. [REDACTED] IS A LIAR AND SHE IS SLANDERING ME. I HAVE HER SIGNATURES AND SHE KNEW EXACTLY ALL FEES. SHE HAS A GAMBLING PROBLEM AND DOESNT WANNA PY BACK HER DEBTS DESPITE HER EXCESSIVE INCOME. SHE IS A CROOK WHO DOESN'T PAY HER BILLS

Now THAT'S how to treat a client! The original comment posted by the client would actually be libel, not slander, but he's a bankruptcy attorney so we'll give him a pass. Goldberg is certainly feisty, but will it be enough to overcome the man who never ages ...

Frank Sorrentino

Anyone who has lived in Vegas for a while is familiar with the name "Attorney Frank Sorrentino." Not because of his reputation for being a good attorney, but because of his reputation for producing the most god-awful commercial to ever run on local television.

Sorrentino's "forever 1985" style advertisement has been going strong since, well, the 1980's. The commercial itself has remained unchanged.

We've been meaning to pay his office a visit to see what he actually looks like 20 years later. We just can't seem to find a recent photograph of the man (besides the screen-capture from his commercial that he posts on his website). Maybe he can't be photographed ... like a vampire!

We're not real familiar with his reputation in legal circles, so you readers will have to enlighten us in the comments. We would be very interested in hearing any background information regarding those commercials. Did he pay so much for them that he is still recouping his costs? Does he not know they look dated? Was he hideously disfigured in the early 1990's? Inquiring minds want to know!

So there you have it, feistiness vs. experience. What do you think, readers?

Greetings from a fellow blogger!

Thanks to your generous invitation to post on your blog, I wanted to introduce myself (here) and highlight a few of my recent posts on my own blog. First, a shout-out to Jim Shea, local Las Vegas bankruptcy guru and a member of the American Bankruptcy Institute's executive committee, who speaks about our current bankruptcy crisis in today's Las Vegas Sun (see here). Second, my own thoughts (written before the governor's draconian budget proposal) about the usefulness of higher education to Nevada (see here). I'm looking forward to getting to know "all y'all" (as we say back in my native Texas).

(Posted by Nancy Rapoport)