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Las Vegas lawyer facing felony charges disbarred
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LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Updated: Nov. 17, 2011 | 8:05 a.m.
Nearly four years after the Nevada Supreme Court suspended Las Vegas lawyer Jeanne Winkler from practicing law, the court has disbarred her.
"This matter stemmed from financial difficulties Winkler experienced, resulting in her misappropriating approximately $233,000 from her client trust account and borrowing $115,000 from a client," according to the disbarment order filed Wednesday.
Winkler, 44, was arrested in February on theft and embezzlement charges. Her preliminary hearing is scheduled for Dec. 12 in Las Vegas Justice Court.
Winkler is charged with seven counts of theft and two counts of embezzlement involving a victim who is 60 or older. Both charges are felonies.
The criminal complaint alleges the crimes occurred between March 2006 and November 2008.
The state Supreme Court suspended Winkler in March 2008, and the Clark County district attorney's office filed a felony bad-check charge against her in April 2008. Winkler was accused of bouncing four checks, but the charge was dismissed after she paid about $7,000 in restitution.
The Las Vegas police criminal intelligence section began investigating the theft allegations against Winkler in March 2009.
According to the disbarment order, Winkler's troubles began when an employee of her husband's business, Direct Electric, embezzled about $350,000.
"Keeping Direct Electric afloat caused a financial strain on Winkler's law office," the document said. "Eventually, both businesses began to crumble."
In December 2006, according to the order, a Family Court judicial officer presented Winkler with an investment opportunity. During Winkler's disciplinary hearing last year, that officer was identified as Family Court Judge Steven Jones.
"Although Winkler initially invested her own money in the endeavor, she eventually withdrew money from her client trust account to fund the investment," according to the order. "Ultimately, she invested $500,000, of which $233,000 was client trust fund money. The investment yielded nothing."
Around this time, Winkler borrowed $115,000 from client Debra Hood.
Most of Winkler's former clients have been repaid by the State Bar of Nevada's Client Security Fund.
Following the March 2010 disciplinary hearing, a panel of the Southern Nevada Disciplinary Board recommended disbarment.
Winkler received her Nevada law license in 1999. She primarily handled cases in Family Court.
The state Supreme Court also took action Wednesday against two other lawyers, James Sitter and James Parsa.
Justices ordered a four-year suspension for Sitter, 66, who received his Nevada law license in 1977.
The court ruled that the suspension began when it temporarily suspended Sitter in March 2009. Sitter, who lives in Arizona but practiced law in Las Vegas, was accused of misappropriating trust account funds.
Justices temporarily suspended Parsa, 46, pending the resolution of formal disciplinary proceedings against him.
According to the order, Parsa was convicted in 2001 in California of two misdemeanor counts of unlawful sexual intercourse. In 2009, Parsa resigned from the California Bar while disciplinary proceedings were pending. He is accused of failing to report that information to the State Bar of Nevada.
Parsa has been licensed in Nevada since 2000, but State Bar of Nevada records list a California address for him.
Contact reporter Carri Geer Thevenot at cgeer@reviewjournal.com or 702-384-8710.
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So Steve Jones is mentioned in yet another scandal. This isn't the first time someone has said that Jones has convinced them to make an investment with him where they lose EVERYTHING - - and yet he manages to avoid charges each and every time. Nice to have good friends in high places!
Look for Winkler's name to come up in the FBI's HOA investigation next.
My advice to Jeanne Winkler, if she reads these comments is: Go back to school, get an M.B.A. You can put "J.D. (law degree) and M.B.A." on your business cards, then resume using your maiden name so if anyone Googles you, you cannot be found. I was doing business with a woman from New Hampshire, she is making decent money. I asked her why she did not practice law and she stated that she had in the past but was disbarred after being convicted of bank fraud. I could not find her on the web, b/c she went back to her maiden name after the divorce. Eventually she told me and I read her conviction--she was flipping houses and lied to the bank about her income/intent to occupy the house. Everybody does it (loan officers encourage it so they can close) and nobody cared until the housing market tanked. This compatriot of mine, a savvy business woman, got her MBA in a year and is happier now that she is not a lawyer. Life throws curve balls and sucker punches, in this case you hit yourself through theft. However, nobody can take away your legal education and it means a lot when coupled with an MBA. My advice Jeanne, it's worth what you paid for it. I wish I was still an engineer at General Dynamics in San Diego, but I'm not. It closed. There were way too many engineers in the early 90s so I struck out on my own. I'm successful and happy, I do miss GD, my cubicle, my co-workers--but what choice do I have except to carry on? None.
These are the legal begals that charge you $350.00 per hour or more to talk to you while they steal their clients blind. Wonder how many more are doing the same thing.
Karma, is reflecting upon LV Enforcement. Cops, Lawyers DA's Judges. There are some, not many, but some among us who do not shudder or recoil at the thought of working arbitraril­y against the interests of any and all who cross their paths. These peopele are those who are filled with such venom, such bitterness of character that they use belittleme­nt, petty criticism, beratement as weapons against those with true virtue. While the virtuous search out truth, sacrifice for the sake of integrity, and indeed hunt for wisdom, and justice, and true meaning, the unscrupulo­us few do quite the opposite. They use every means to attack others, they use every method to deny their own faults, and they spread slander without care. But when confronted­, they will be the first to cry for justice, to cry for rule of law, to stand on policy, and to demand enforcemen­t of regulation­. They are the first to claim victimhood and wear it as they would vestments of honor. But they fail to recognize that there is penalty for such misconduct­. For the conscience­, though disabled for a time, cannot be completely negated. Conscience­, though seeming to be dead, only sleeps. Once again aroused in them by chance or by charisma of another, it will evoke such self-disda­in and such emotional pain that they will experience all that they have inflicted upon others after the fact. And this will be their purgatory, this will be their shame to no end. For this is what they have cultivated in themselve.
You must really do something bad to get disbarred in NV. What state can she go work in now? Don't the disbarred lawyers from other states come here? Same applies to doctors too.
This is why local elections matter.
For the lawyers and by the lawyers managed by the judges. Citizens are only pawns in their jury pools.
And Judge Steven E. Jones got off with no penalty! Judge Steven E. Jones should not be serving because his "appearance of improprieties (history) makes one pause to be judged by such And his rulings are based on $$ over law (I know and got his ruling overturned on appeal) AND he allowed Rizzolo to get a quickie divorce even after Rizzolo was waiting trial (etc) so that RIzzolo could have his wife take their money off-shore and not pay the Henry's (who is paralyzed for not paying the tip on an $80.00 food bill)
Why Jeanne did not implicate Jones (who led her to his brother in law's phoney "ponzi" deal) is the big question.
It pays to be connected to the "mob"