LAWRENCE COUNTY, Ala. (WHNT) — A long-running story covered by News 19 has a major update, the lawyer at the center of the case has been disbarred.
Last year, News 19 reported on problems surrounding a contaminated drinking water lawsuit settlement involving 3M and more than a thousand people in Lawrence and Morgan counties.
News 19 learned scores of people who signed up for the lawsuit did not receive settlement payments.
That award-winning reporting found that attorneys representing the people would not respond to their calls, multiple requests by News 19 for for an interview, or answer questions about what happened.
Numerous people told News 19 that once settlement checks started going out in 2022, they didn’t receive any money, even though they’d signed up and consented to be represented by the Stewart firm.
Repeated efforts to get answers failed, from phone calls to office visits, even small claims lawsuits against Taylor Stewart. They all went unanswered. After years without any response, we reported that more than 150 residents eventually filed complaints to the Alabama Bar Association last summer, and those complaints led to an investigation.
News 19 contacted the bar association this week regarding the investigation into Stewart.
The Alabama Bar Association said it investigated the case, and that led to him losing his license to practice law:
“We received a number of complaints against Mr. Stewart that contained allegations consistent with your reporting. As in any ethics matter, when we get allegations of misconduct we ask the accused attorney to respond and provide his or her side of the story. Mr. Stewart initially told us that he had filed a response to the allegations with our office. When we did not receive them, we asked him to submit the response to the allegations again. We never received a response from him concerning the allegations against him.
“We received a number of complaints against Mr. Stewart that contained allegations consistent with your reporting. As in any ethics matter, when we get allegations of misconduct we ask the accused attorney to respond and provide his or her side of the story. Mr. Stewart initially told us that he had filed a response to the allegations with our office. When we did not receive them, we asked him to submit the response to the allegations again. We never received a response from him concerning the allegations against him. However, we did receive a response purporting to be from his father, and law partner, denying any wrongdoing. Upon contacting the father about the response, it was clear to us that William Taylor Stewart had filed the response on behalf of his father, without consulting him first. Based on this incident, and the fact he had not filed a response to the allegations against him, we told William Taylor Stewart, that we would only resolve the ethics charges if he agreed to a disbarment. As you know, this is the worst punishment we can impose on a lawyer. He agreed and consented to the disbarment as evidence by the documents you have.”
The Alabama Bar said Taylor Stewart was disbarred in March after failing to respond to questions and providing false information. An attorney can file for reinstatement to practice law five year after being disbarred, the bar association told News 19. Reinstatement would require a disbarred attorney to prove to a disciplinary panel that he has the character and fitness to resume the practice of law, the bar association said.
Today, the Alabama Bar Association told News 19 that people with complaints about a disbarred attorney can file malpractice lawsuits or seek compensation from a bar committee.
The bar association said it maintains a client security fund that is managed by a committee that reviews claims by people injured by attorney misconduct.
The bar said that the committee does have a few restrictions:
- Individual claims for compensation are capped at $100,000 per person and $270,000 in the aggregate.
- No single individual can receive more than $100,000, regardless of the amount they lost due to their lawyer’s misconduct.
- If the client receives an award of compensation from a civil lawsuit, that amount would be taken into consideration when deciding how much the person could receive.
News 19 will continue its investigation into Sinking Settlement Hopes and will provide updates as we get them.
The post Sinking Settlement Hopes: Lawyer involved in 3M settlement disbarred appeared first on WHNT.
