Supreme Court discipline order draws dissent from 2 justices

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Minnesota attorney Albert Isiaka Usumanu has been publicly reprimanded and will be on supervised probation for two years. While the Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility and the majority of the Minnesota Supreme Court agree on the punishment, some members of the court have taken issue with it, surmising that it will not deter future misconduct from Usumanu.

Usumanu has been practicing law in Minnesota since his graduation in 1994. As an attorney for Ausum Law Firm, Usumanu provides legal services in criminal defense, family law, personal injury and malpractice. He also has served as an attorney in immigration matters. It is Usumanu’s misconduct in two immigration cases that has triggered the discipline issue.

In the first case, Usumanu was hired by an individual to represent him in a possible bond appeal and raise an asylum claim related to removal proceedings. However, Usumanu never filed anything with the immigration court to note his appearance in the removal proceedings. The client was personally served with notice, and the client texted a picture of the removal papers to Usumanu, asking if he needed to attend the hearing. Usumanu incorrectly advised the client that there was no hearing, and so the immigration court ordered the client removed. The client did get a different lawyer, who was able to reopen the removal proceedings.

The second case involved a client attempting to obtain a U-Visa before the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. That U-Visa application was denied, and the client later was informed she needed to appear for removal proceedings. The client went with another attorney, but Usumanu failed to promptly provide the new attorney with a copy of her file after it was requested.

Usumanu is not a newcomer for attorney discipline, being admonished five times (2001, 2002, twice in 2007, and in 2011) for various sorts of misconduct. He was also suspended for 30 days in 2009 for failure to comply with recordkeeping rules and not cooperating with the disciplinary investigation surrounding it. Usumanu was publicly reprimanded in 2017 for not communicating with a client, not diligently representing the client, and not putting fees into a trust or providing an accounting of those fees.

While the court acknowledged Usumanu’s disciplinary history, it ultimately did not impose harsher discipline because it had given the same punishment to attorneys who had a similar or more substantial disciplinary history. It also cited that there were mitigating factors in this case, including extreme stress from a medical condition, remorse, and Usumanu’s history of providing pro bono services. The dissent, the majority wrote, did not give appropriate attention to the mitigating factors. The order was signed by Justice Natalie E. Hudson.

Justices Gordon L. Moore and Anne K. McKeig dissented, arguing that Usumanu should have been suspended for at least 30 days, followed by probation. In his dissent, Justice Moore expressed that the director of the Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility and Usumanu “underplay the harm to his clients because of his misconduct.” Responding to the court’s Feb. 18, 2022, order to show cause for why Usumanu should not be more severely disciplined, the director maintained that the misconduct caused no harm or at least no serious harm. Justice Moore disagreed: “Yet in both cases Usumanu’s clients were under the threat of removal, and Usumanu’s lack of diligence either caused this threat or caused delay.”

Justice Moore also claimed that the vulnerability of immigration clients, especially, should be given more weight. Both of the clients in Usumanu’s case did not have an immigration status and relied on their attorney to help them navigate the process of getting legal status. “[A] public reprimand, even with added probation, is not sufficient to serve the purposes of deterring future misconduct on Usumanu’s part and protecting the public, especially those who are vulnerable,” Justice Moore wrote.