 |
| MATTHEW MAHLON HENRY - BEFORE & AFTER HE STOLE $400K FROM CLIENT |
Matthew Henry, a sketchy Little Rock attorney with a history of clients filing lawsuits against him has gotten himself in a real jam.
He stole approximately $400,000 from a client and $25,000 from another. He also failed to pay child support.
Henry is represented by an attorney that usually represents guilty individuals, Jeff Rosenzweig.
 |
| JEFF ROSENZWEIG - DEFENDER OF THE GUILTY |
The Arkansas Office of the Committee on Professional Conduct has suspended Henry's law license and will probably take it. And they should.
Henry failed to pay child support so the judge in his domestic relations case issued a pick-up order for his arrest.
Henry was arrested and wrote a check on his law firm account to get out of the pokey. Unfortunately, the check bounced.
Henry also failed to pay his state income taxes when due and the Department of Fiance and Administration filed a lien against him. That debt is still outstanding.
Henry has also been sued by a court reporter for failing to pay for services in transcribing a deposition.
Another client of Henry's sued him back in 2016 and obtained a judgment against him. That judgment has never been paid as well.
Henry was also sued by a landlord for non-payment of rent but due to technicality the lawsuit was dismissed.
Henry also failed to pay the required fees to operate a business in Little Rock.
It appears that he paid the fees and the charges were dismissed. Even a shyster deserves a break every now and then.
However, Henry will not be able to wiggle out of the mess he has made for himself.
Stay tuned for updates.
***UPDATE - 9/14/18***
U.S. District Judge James Moody accepted a guilty plea from Matthew Mahlon Henry, 45, who has been a licensed attorney for 13 years. U.S. District Judge Billy Roy Wilson, for whom Moody was filling in Thursday, will sentence Henry on December 19th at 2 p.m.
Henry faces up to 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000, and will be required to pay restitution of at least $440,658.09, according to court documents. The amount of money he took and the fact that he abused a position of trust, as the victim's attorney, will subject him to a higher penalty range than a single count of wire fraud would otherwise bring, according to his plea agreement.
According to a charging document, Henry, who ran The Henry Firm in Little Rock, was retained in February 2015 to perform probate work related to a client's deceased relative. As part of his representation of the client, he received about $440,000 in estate funds between August 2015 and August 2016, which he deposited into his client's trust account.
Between August 2015 and January of this year, the charging document states, Henry intentionally schemed to defraud the trust account by making multiple incremental transfers from the account at Arvest Bank into his own business account at Arvest. He then used his business account to pay for business and personal expenses.
It says he made about 200 transfers out of the trust account, with the amounts typically ranging from $500 to $5,000. The frequency of the transfers varied from two in one month to 14 in a single month, and ended when the account was depleted, the document states.
It noted that Henry had agreed to represent the client for a minimum $12,000 retainer.
Henry didn't pay any of the estate funds to the client, who retained another attorney, according to the charging document. It said that on Feb. 23, Henry emailed the client's new attorney and said that in three days, he would deliver $403,658.09 that he owed the client. It said he attached a fake email chain indicating he had asked an Arvest Bank official to prepare a certified check in that amount from the trust account, but in fact, on Feb. 26, the account had a balance of only $6.59.
Records at the Arkansas Supreme Court show that on March 7, the Supreme Court Office on Professional Conduct suspended Henry from practicing law for violating Rule 1.15 of the Arkansas Rules of Professional Conduct, which concerns safekeeping property and trust accounts.
An order signed that day doesn't place a time limit on the suspension. It said that Stark Ligon, the office's executive director, had alleged that Henry "poses a substantial threat of serious harm to the public and to his clients if he continues to practice law."
In response to Ligon's petition, the Committee on Professional Conduct classified the allegations as "serious misconduct," and noted that about $400,000 in client funds from a Jefferson County Circuit Court case "are not presently accounted for by Mr. Henry."
The order of interim suspension said Henry had also been ordered to show cause in March why he failed to obey a Pulaski County Circuit judge's Jan. 23 order directing him to pay over $25,000 in funds that he claimed to be holding as part of a civil case, and to provide the court all of the firm's trust account records dating back to Oct. 1, 2017.
***UPDATE 02/21/19***
Disgraced and soon to be an ex-attorney Matthew Mahlon Henry, was sentenced yesterday to the maximum recommended sentence of just under three years in federal prison for stealing $440,658.09 from two clients.
U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr. sided with Assistant U.S. Attorney Jana Harris in sentencing Henry, 45, who has been a licensed attorney for more than 13 years, to 33 months in prison on a wire-fraud charge.
Federal sentencing guidelines suggested a penalty range of 27 to 33 months for Henry, who in September admitted incrementally taking $415,658.09 from a client's trust account between August 2015 and January 2018, and also siphoning $25,000 out of an account he maintained for a business client, CSI Renovations.
Henry's attorney, Jeff Rosenzweig, asked Marshall to sentence Henry within the guideline range, conceding that "incarceration is inevitable."
Henry also addressed the court, saying that in an effort to explain how he ended up before Marshall, but not to make excuses, "I made these choices in a time of great pain for me and I essentially lost my mind, lost my bearings. ... I've not led a life of theft and dereliction and treachery, but for some reason, I engaged in that. ... I'm incredibly sorry for those choices and the pain I caused to the victims and my chosen profession."
In imposing Henry's sentence for wire fraud, Marshall noted that if it weren't for the jail time Henry had already served on the contempt finding, he "would consider even a lengthier sentence" than that recommended by the guidelines.
He noted that "a lot of us in this room are lawyers, and people come to us in the most challenging moments of their lives," expecting to be protected.
"This was not one bad decision, or two. It was a pattern of conduct over an extended period of time, and that weighs in the court's mind," Marshall said.
Attorneys entrusted with someone else's money, he said, "have to be above reproach. You act for those who are depending on you."
Hinting at the possible origin of Henry's troubles, as apparently spelled out in a confidential presentence report, Marshall said he would recommend that Henry participate in a residential drug-abuse program while he is in prison because, "as you know, more than I do, that has been part of your challenges."
Marshall also recommended that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons require Henry to participate in mental-health counseling.
Henry's sentence requires him to make full restitution to both victims, with 50 percent of the funds available to him during his incarceration being divided equally between them. Once out of prison, 10 percent of his gross income is to be divided between the two victims until the entire amount is paid.
