KAILUA-KONA — A Kailua-Kona attorney surrendered her law license rather than face discipline after a finding said she had diverting money and violated several professional rules.
Diana Danmeyer joined the state bar in 1998.
The filing by the board alleged that she and two of her eventual clients met Michael Pines, a California-licensed attorney without a license in Hawaii, during a seminar on mortgage foreclosure.
In September 2010, all four signed an agreement to help the clients regain possession of one foreclosed property and prevent the foreclosure of another. It was signed as Pines and Danmeyer as attorneys, the board said, which violated Hawaii rules that only licensed lawyers can act as attorneys.
When the clients began sending her the retainer, the board said Danmeyer deposited the money directly into her business account.
Hawaii rules dictate that money sent by clients be deposited in trust accounts, where they remain until earned.
On at least six occasions she used unlabelled bank deposit slips to make the deposits.
Pines was disbarred from practicing law in November 2012 after being arrested for threatening the occupants of a home formerly owned by a client and encouraging clients to move back into foreclosed homes, according to the California State Bar. The process began in May of 2011 and he did not respond to the allegation, the bar’s website said.
The clients and Danmeyer reformed their agreement, with payments similar to the original one, but added that she would get between 30 and 40 percent of the mortgage payment discount.
“Extinguishment of the existing fee agreements and entering into the new agreement on March 17, 2011, was not fair and reasonable to (the clients),” the complaint reads.
On July 4, 2012, the clients asked for an accounting of the $34,000 paid to that point, and a demand on a return of $17,000 for the legal services on one of the properties.
After Danmeyer delayed in responding, the clients filed a complaint and the board began to investigate.
When asked, she did not turn over records demanded by the professional rules. The document said she claimed she did not need to keep track.
The fact that she did not turn over the records was also considered a violation.
She then filed a request to resign instead of discipline, which was granted.
This was her second censure by the disciplinary board. In 2013, they found that she had not done sufficient research for one of her cases, trying to argue the “Redemption Theory” of finance.
“The Redemption Theory” claims the U.S. government went bankrupt when it abandoned the gold standard basis for currency in 1933 and began using citizens as collateral in trade agreements with foreign governments,” according to the FBI.
“In essence, it is extorting money from the U.S. Treasury Department,” the FBI said.
At that point she could have been suspended, but the board found “full and free disclosure to the disciplinary authorities, her cooperative attitude, the sincere expression of remorse” and lack of previous discipline sufficient to choose an alternative.
They ordered her to take a course on “effective legal research.”
The Supreme Court Rules prevent the Disciplinary Board from releasing if an attorney has had any non-public disciplinary action.
Calls to Danmeyer were not returned.