Any criminal defense lawyer who has suffered through a civil deposition knows that “civil lawyers” are not like us.  It’s long been my theory that this is all about displaced anger at the fact that they tell people at cocktail parties that they’re litigators, but know in their hearts that they couldn’t find the courthouse with a map.  They are ashamed of their deception, their pretense. 

When they get the opportunity to play “tough” lawyer, this seething anger and shame within surfaces.  They go bonkers at depositions over nothing to prove how macho they are.  They argue motions over discovery deadlines as if lives are in the balance.  And they treat each other like dirt.  Or in St. Petersburg, worse than dirt.

From the St. Petersburg Times:

The e-mail messages show two lawyers trying to schedule hearings and depositions for a lawsuit. They can’t agree on dates, or much of anything else.

Then it gets ugly.

Tampa lawyer Nicholas F. Mooney calls his opponent a jerk and a “junior lawyer.” Palmetto lawyer Kurt D. Mitchell questions Mooney’s mental health. The name-calling continues over six months.

Jerk?  Junior?  Seriously?  If you’re going to smack each other, you need to do a whole lot better than that.  And they did.

Mooney said his caseload includes more than 200 cases, “many of which were more important/significant than these little Mag Moss claims that are handled by bottom feeding/scum sucking/loser lawyers like yourself.”

What do you call it when a lawyer calls another lawyer a “bottom feeding/scum sucking/loser lawyer”?  A start.

In October, the insults got truly personal. Mitchell said he was looking online for a mental disability based on Mooney’s “symptoms,” such as “closely spaced eyes, dull blank stare, bulbous head, lying and inability to tell fiction from reality.” Mooney, who said his son has a birth defect, called Mitchell a jerk and suggested he look in the mirror for signs of mental disability. “Then check your children (if they are even yours. … Better check the garbage man that comes by your trailer to make sure they don’t look like him).”

Mitchell’s reply: “While I am sorry to hear about your disabled child; that sort of thing is to be expected when a retard reproduces. … Do not hate me, hate your genetics. However, I would look at the bright side, at least you definitely know the kid is yours.”

Decorum generally suggests that one draw the line at a disabled child. Not a chance.  Not only does Mitchell refuse to back off in the face of Mooney’s disabled child, but he seizes upon it as the launching pad for his next round of smacks. 

Some may see this as two lawyers who are overly antagonistic, immature and lacking in the judgment normally found in a rock.  Not me.  I see this as the by-product of the civil litigator syndrome, where machismo lacks a viable outlet and ends up spewing all over a professional relationship.  And some thing us criminal lawyers have disagreements.  We’re boy scouts, I tell ya.

And so, I offer some unsolicited advice to Messrs Mitchell and Mooney.  Nobody wins anything by writing nasty emails.  Mud wrestling is where real men prove the mettle.

And the State of Florida wasn’t impressed either.

After two complaints by the Florida Bar, Mitchell was suspended for 10 days and was ordered to attend an anger management class. Mooney gets a public reprimand and must take a class on professionalism.

I understand that private anger management classes are available from  Brian Tannebaum to members of the bar at a very reasonable fee, and will be  conducted on twitter in order to make sure that the public reprimand if as public as it gets.