State representative found guilty of barratry
Reynolds convicted of soliciting clients illegally, plans to appeal jury’s verdict
State Rep. Ron Reynolds was convicted Friday of illegally soliciting clients in an “ambulance chasing for profit” scheme, a verdict that carries the threat of jail time and deals a blow to his political career but won’t require him to leave office.
A Montgomery County jury convicted Reynolds, a Missouri City Democrat, of five counts of misdemeanor barratry after a weeklong trial in which he represented himself. He was among eight Houston- area lawyers charged in 2013; Reynolds is the only one who did not accept a plea deal.
A teary-eyed Reynolds hugged his wife after the verdict was read.
“I always respect the jury’s verdict. But while I respect it, I disagree. Based on the evidence, it did not show that I ever knowingly accepted a solicited case,” said Reynolds, the first African-American elected state representative in Fort Bend County since Reconstruction.
Reynolds said he planned to appeal because he doesn’t believe the law was followed.
Prosecutor Joel Daniels said he could not comment because the tri- al was ongoing. The jury still must decide punishment for Reynolds, who faces up to a year in prison and a $10,000 fine.
The first witness in the punishment phase, called by prosecutors after the guilty verdict was announced, was the Texas Ethics Commission’s enforcement director, John Moore. He testified about Reynolds’ failure
to file eight campaign finance reports on the dates required by law, and how he as a result still owes $20,000 in fines and has three default judgments pending against him. More witnesses will be called Monday morning when the punishment phase resumes before County Court-at-Law Judge Mary Ann Turner.
Texas law bars lawyers — as well as licensed chiropractors, physicians and private investigators — from soliciting clients for accident or disaster claims until at least 30 days after the incident. The law is designed to protect victims from fraud and swarms of attorneys.
‘Conscience is clear’
Before Reynolds was found guilty of barratry, Robert Ramirez Valdez, Sr., a four-time felon, testified that the lawmaker paid him an average of $ 1,000 for each client recruited for his law firm.
Valdez said he would glean names of accident victims from police reports and persuade them to sign a contract for Reynolds to represent them. Reynolds contended that he did not know the clients were being illegally solicited; prosecutors said Reynolds was one of eight lawyers paying Valdez thousands of dollars to do just that. Valdez is serving a five-year prison sentence for his role in the scheme.
“This DA’s office is very disingenuous and misleading, wasting the taxpayers’ dollars on a very frivolous case,” Reynolds said in closing arguments Friday.
At one point, the threeterm lawmaker began breaking down as he spoke.
“I am a father of three children. This has been very embarrassing,” said Reynolds, alleging that prosecutors wanted to put a notch on their belts by convicting a state lawmaker. “The real criminal will soon be allowed to walk free who concocted these stories. My conscience is clear.”
In closing arguments, Daniels emphasized that the case was one of the rare prosecutions for this offense. He said Reynolds made a “spectacle” of a “noble profession.”
But Daniels said Reynolds was right about one thing: “We do want to convict a state representative.”
“He walks around like a peacock bragging about being elected to state office,” Daniels said, but he is just a “criminal” walking around in a suit and tie with flag lapel pins.
During the trial, several witnesses who said they had signed contracts for Reynolds to represent them said they never saw him in person until coming to the courtroom for his criminal trial.
One 2012 accident victim represented by Reynolds, Carolina Catelan, testified that she had never heard of Reynolds until approached by Valdez’s ex-wife, Crystal. She said Robert Valdez pressured her into signing up with Reynolds by promising her a copy of her police report, which she needed to get a rental car.
In the end, she said, the law firm provided a rundown rental and then sent her car to a shop that left her vehicle with a dangerous leaky gas tank.
After retaining Reynolds, she testified that she spoke to him for only a few minutes while her 2-yearold daughter was in the hospital. They never talked again, she said, and she never saw him in person until coming to the courtroom.
She said she received a phone call from his secretary to pick up a check for $ 1,300 only after her case was settled with the insurance company. But she said she had never approved the settlement and was unhappy with the small amount, as the stress from the accident had given her daughter, who has a genetic illness, a “bad setback.”
When Reynolds later took the stand to testify on his own behalf, he was questioned about his having signed Catelan’s name to the insurance settlement. He insisted that he had her permission and that if she said otherwise, she had lied.
Reynolds’ main defense was that he had gotten the six clients whom prosecutors said had been illegally solicited to acknowledge that they had never personally told him they were recruited by Valdez.
‘But you paid me’
The lawmaker also got Valdez to acknowledge under cross-examination that he, too, had never verbally told Reynolds that he was soliciting clients.
Valdez snapped back, “But you paid me for them.”
The trial was held in Montgomery County because that’s where Valdez lived when he ran the barratry scheme from his home; all of the accident victims in this case were from Harris County.
Reynolds was easily reelected in November 2014 during his first trial just before a jury found him guilty of six counts of “solicitation of professional employment,” or misdemeanor barratry.
But that guilty verdict was overturned by state District Judge Lisa Michalk, who declared a mistrial after one juror reported being influenced by another juror who told her other attorneys had already admitted involvement in the client referral scheme.
The first jury found insufficient evidence that Reynolds had committed a felony, and prosecutors agreed it would have been “double jeopardy” to charge him again with a felony.
‘White out’ allegation
Reynolds did not take the stand in his first trial, but in a surprise move decided to testify on his own behalf in this week’s trial.
From the stand, Reynolds denied paying for clients: “Never — it’s illegal and against the rules of ethics.”
But Daniels questioned him about a “white out” in paperwork of his office file that concealed the name of Robert Valdez as the person making client referrals to Reynolds.
Reynolds denied having written the name on the file or covering it up.
Reynolds also was questioned about similar allegations of soliciting clients in Harris County in 2012. He called the case “frivolous” and again denied knowing clients were solicited.
But a former prosecutor, Wendy Baker, was brought in to testify and implied Reynolds was fully aware of those solicitations.
“I know what you told me,” she told Reynolds.
That time, he was accused of using a chiropractic firm to persuade patients to sign contracts naming him as their attorney before they had ever been examined or met him. However, those charges were dismissed after a Harris County investigator who worked the case was accused of stealing evidence in another case.
Reynolds represents House District 27, which covers parts of Houston, Missouri City, Sugar Land, Pearland, Stafford, Fresno and Arcola.