In re Disciplinary Proceedings Against Siderits

Siderits (defendant), needing to exceed a minimum billable-hours threshold to qualify for an annual bonus, recorded time he had not actually worked and later deleted legitimate billable-time records from the following year to compensate, netting him $47,000 in bonuses over two years while his firm lost the revenue for time it never actually billed clients; in the resulting disciplinary proceedings, Siderits argued he had no knowledge of case law establishing that an attorney owes his firm a fiduciary duty equivalent to the duty owed a client.