Two South Florida lawyers are on the sidelines for three years after court records say they signed a deceased client’s name on settlement papers and pocketed the settlement money. Boca Raton attorney Lee Sarkin and Ocean Ridge lawyer Drew Levitt admitted to ethics violations and accepted matching three-year suspensions tied to Americans With Disabilities Act lawsuits their firm handled for a man who died while settlement talks were still in motion.
The Florida Supreme Court signed off on their conditional guilty pleas and ordered the three-year suspensions, effective 30 days after its June 4 order, according to the Supreme Court of Florida. The justices told the lawyers to stop taking new clients, wind down existing cases, turn over trust-account records and pay disciplinary costs to the bar. The order also requires them to comply with trust-account audits and other safeguards meant to protect client funds.
What the federal court found
In an April 2023 ruling, a federal judge concluded Sarkin and Levitt signed plaintiff David Poschmann’s name to a settlement after he died on Nov. 12, 2021, then took their fees into the firm’s trust account. The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida tossed out that settlement, labeled the conduct a “fraud on the court,” and ordered the attorneys to return the fees paid under the deal and to cover additional attorney’s fees and sanctions, according to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida. Those findings later became key evidence in the state disciplinary case.
Another settlement, returned money
Federal and bar records say the lawyers reached a second post-death settlement in a case against the Linda Young Reffitt Revocable Trust in December 2021 and circulated a version that showed a handwritten signature for Poschmann. The trust paid the agreed amount and the case was dismissed. But after counsel for the trust discovered Poschmann had already died, the attorneys sent back the settlement proceeds on May 8, 2023, according to filings from The Florida Bar. Those documents spell out the specific rules the lawyers admitted violating and the discipline they agreed to accept.
Sanctions and federal discipline
Before the state bar stepped in, the federal court had already taken action. The Middle District adopted a grievance-committee report and suspended both lawyers from its bar for nine months, setting remediation and continuing-education requirements before they can ask to return. The November 1, 2023 order barred them from taking new cases in the Middle District and laid out steps, including CLE courses, remediation and payment of sanctions, that they must complete before any reinstatement, according to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida. Those federal sanctions, combined with the bar proceedings, helped shape the state-level punishment that followed.
Why the courts say this matters
Judges did not treat the episode as a clerical flub. By signing a deceased client’s name, the lawyers misrepresented the client’s consent and deprived opposing counsel and the court of accurate information. The filings say the conduct breached duties of diligence, candor to the tribunal and fairness to opposing parties, and that it chipped away at trust in litigation brought by non-visible ADA “tester” plaintiffs. For lawyers who run high-volume ADA tester cases, the rulings read as a blunt reminder about the limits of settlement authority and the heightened care required when a client suddenly cannot be reached.
The case was first reported by the Miami Herald, and this account is drawn from that coverage as well as the federal court and Florida Bar documents cited above.
