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NOTICE: This opinion is subject to motions for rehearing under Rule 22 as well as formal revision before publication in the New Hampshire Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter, Supreme Court of New Hampshire, One Charles Doe Drive, Concord, New Hampshire 03301, of any editorial errors in order that corrections may be made before the opinion goes to press. Errors may be reported by E-mail at the following address: reporter@courts.state.nh.us. Opinions are available on the Internet by 9:00 a.m. on the morning of their release. The direct address of the court's home page is: http://www.courts.state.nh.us/supreme. THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW HAMPSHIRE ___________________________ Original No. LD-2011-006 CLARK'S CASE Argued: November 10, 2011 Opinion Issued: January 13, 2012 James L. Kruse, of Concord, on the brief and orally, for the professional conduct committee. Upton & Hatfield, LLP, of Portsmouth (Russell F. Hilliard on the brief and orally), for the respondent. LYNN, J. On May 12, 2011, the Supreme Court Professional Conduct Committee (PCC) filed a petition recommending disbarment of the respondent, Grenville Clark, III. We order the respondent disbarred. I The record supports the following undisputed facts. In September 2008, Heidi Gaudreau hired the respondent, an attorney licensed in New Hampshire since 1971, to help her file for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 13 of the United States Bankruptcy Code. This chapter of the Code allows individuals to reorganize their finances and repay creditors over time. Gaudreau had recently married and insisted that her husband and his income not be involved in the

bankruptcy petition. The respondent, thus aware of his client's husband and income, prepared the necessary documents and submitted them to the bankruptcy court. One of those documents is Schedule I, "Current Monthly Income of Individual Debtor(s)," which calls for the preparer to supply the debtor's monthly income in one column and the debtor's spouse's monthly income in the other column. At the top of that document, the form states: "The column labeled `Spouse' must be completed in all cases . . . by every married debtor, whether or not a joint petition is filed, unless the spouses are separated and a joint petition is not filed." The respondent nevertheless entered zeroes in the spousal income column. On the line reserved for "other monthly income" of the debtor, the respondent entered "$2,195.00" in the appropriate field and wrote "contributions from spouse" on the corresponding line. Another document filed by the respondent with Gaudreau's petition was the "Chapter 13 Statement of Current Monthly Income and Calculation of Commitment Period and Disposable Income." On that form, the respondent also entered zeroes in the column designated for the debtor's spouse's income except on line 7, where he entered $365.83 in the spousal income column for "Any amounts paid by another person . . . on a regular basis, for household expenses of the debtor." The next page of that form allows the filer to enter a "marital adjustment" if "calculation of the commitment period . . . does not require inclusion of the [spouse's] income" because such income was not paid on a regular basis for the debtor's household expenses. That adjustment would have allowed Gaudreau to ask the court to subtract the amount of her husband's income not being used for her household expenses from its calculation of the total amount of disposable income in the debtor's household. The respondent entered zeroes in the marital adjustment fields. He filed Gaudreau's bankruptcy petition along with these and other forms in September and October 2008. After a hearing in November 2008, the bankruptcy trustee recommended against confirming Gaudreau's Chapter 13 plan in part because she had not established her disposable income. She then converted her case to a Chapter 7 bankruptcy, but the trustee in that case moved to dismiss based, in part, upon Gaudreau's failure to disclose her husband's income. In June 2009, after the respondent's representation of Gaudreau had terminated, she withdrew her bankruptcy petition, and the bankruptcy court accepted her withdrawal and dismissed the case. Based upon the respondent's representation of Gaudreau in her bankruptcy case, the PCC petitioned this court to disbar the respondent based on its conclusion that he knowingly made a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal in violation of Rule 3.3(a)(1) of the New Hampshire Rules of

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Professional Conduct. The respondent is currently subject to a separate twoyear suspension from the practice of law. II The PCC's findings of violations of the Conduct Rules must be supported by clear and convincing evidence. Sup. Ct. R. 37A(III)(d)(2)(C). In attorney discipline matters, we defer to the PCC's factual findings if supported by the record, but retain ultimate authority to determine whether, on the facts found, a violation of the rules governing attorney conduct has occurred and, if so, what the sanction should be. Young's Case, 154 N.H. 359, 366 (2006). The respondent argues that the PCC lacked clear and convincing evidence that he knowingly made a false statement of fact to the bankruptcy court, in violation of Rule 3.3(a)(1), when he entered zeroes in the columns on the two forms instructing filers to enter the amount of the debtor's spouse's income. He contends that he did not knowingly violate the rule in part because bankruptcy law is unsettled on the issue of what effect spousal income has in a bankruptcy case and in part because he reported his client's spouse's income

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