Back in 2008:

"The board recommends that Kline be suspended from the practice of law for 18 months."

"How to get out of the pickle? After the judgment, Kline finally sat down with the restaurant and negotiated a $50,000 settlement to resolve the counterclaim against the Ad Agency. But Kline didn’t tell the Ad Agency folks he’d settled for a price, only that the two parties had “mutually” agreed to dismiss their legal claims.

So where did the $50,000 come from?"

"Kline cut a check for the secret settlement from his “trust account”—a type of account set up by virtually every legal practice to hold client money completely separate from the funds belonging to lawyers or their firms. (In other words, the money shouldn’t have been Kline’s.) After paying off Savino’s, Kline then turned around and prepared a fake settlement agreement for the Ad Agency omitting any mention of the $50,000."

"That determination, the panel’s report says, was certainly helped by a trio of “character witnesses” who showed up to a hearing earlier this year on Kline’s behalf. They included some big names in the local law community—Dimitri Mallios, the self-styled “dean” of the District’s alcoholic-beverage bar; Fred Cooke, the extremely well-connected former D.C. corporation counsel; and Mark London, a trial lawyer who shares office space with Kline above the Palm restaurant in Dupont Circle."

"In the end, the hearing panel decided not to grant Kline any leniency."

...and it goes on and on and on...

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/loose-lips/article/13036674/lowering-the-bar