Arrangement left multiple clients with poor legal work and lost fees
By Peter Vieth
The Daily Record Newswire
RICHMOND — An Ashland lawyer is in trouble with the Virginia State Bar for allegedly helping to keep a law office going after its owner was suspended by the VSB.
A disciplinary subcommittee charges that attorney William V. Riggenbach acted as cover in 2012 while Robert Smallenberg continued to practice law without a valid license. The arrangement left multiple clients with poor legal work and lost fees, the bar says.
Riggenbach started work as an employee at Smallenberg’s Metropolitan Law Center LLP in Ashland shortly after Smallenberg was suspended for three years in May 2012, according to the VSB charges.
Even though Riggenbach was the only lawyer at the office with a valid license at the time, he told the bar he thought Smallenberg was still licensed, the bar said. Riggenbach claimed he believed Smallenberg’s suspension had been stayed by the state Supreme Court.
In fact, the VSB charged, the court had denied the stay and Smallenberg was suspended. Nevertheless, Smallenberg continued to practice law and manage operations at the office, including management of the bank accounts, the bar said.
By October, Riggenbach learned that Smallenberg was officially suspended and that the VSB was investigating the operations of the law office, the bar said.
Based on advice from the VSB’s Ethics Hotline, Riggenbach formed a new corporation with himself as sole owner and opened new bank accounts for that corporation.
But changing the structure of the firm failed to change its practice, the bar said. The new corporation essentially continued the operation of Smallenberg’s old practice, the VSB said. Although Smallenberg was designated as a paralegal, he continued to manage the office and its bank accounts, the VSB charged.
Riggenbach, meanwhile, arranged to have his paychecks paid to a separate corporation to avoid a $100,491 support obligation to his ex-wife, the bar said.
In November, with nine ethics complaints pending with the VSB, Smallenberg surrendered his law license altogether.
Riggenbach began to have “serious misgivings” about his affiliation with the Smallenberg operation, the bar said. Riggenbach announced he was leaving in mid-December, but Smallenberg asked him to stay until another lawyer could be hired.
The end came in January 2013 when Riggenbach took all the files he could find, gave the staff their last paychecks and removed Smallenberg and his long-time assistant as signatories on the new bank accounts.
Riggenbach went to the VSB office for more ethics advice, the bar said.
It is not clear what advice he got, but he later dissolved the new corporation he had formed and began practicing as VA Law Center, where he continued to represent several former clients of the Ashland firm, the bar said. His biography on that firm’s website said he offers more than 25 years of trial experience.
The Ashland office was closed, Smallenberg’s assistant reportedly found work with another lawyer, and Smallenberg appears to be employed with a property services company, according to his listing on LinkedIn.
The VSB 6th District subcommittee certified charges against Riggenbach in April. The bar said Riggenbach knowingly assisted Smallenberg and his assistant in perpetuating Smallenberg’s law practice after the suspension of his law license.
Moreover, the VSB charged, Riggenbach’s failure to oversee the operations of the law office, even after he formed his own corporation, allowed Smallenberg and the assistant to commit misconduct in their practice.
Riggenbach faces seven separate complaints from clients of the Metropolitan Law Center. Most of the complaints involved disappointed clients with unrefunded fee payments. A Disciplinary Board hearing is scheduled for Oct. 24.
Riggenbach did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
