In THE MATTER OF RYAN CURTIS CLEVELAND (Two Cases)

Ryan Curtis Cleveland, a lawyer admitted to the State Bar of Georgia in 2005, was hired by a client in 2019 to handle a divorce and custody case and was paid a retainer, but he never filed anything in the case and cut off contact even as his client tried to see his daughter. Separately, Cleveland was appointed to represent seven indigent defendants through a county public defender contract, and in those cases too he stopped communicating with jailed clients and their families, missed deadlines, and misled at least one family about the case's status. The State Bar's Disciplinary Board filed two Notices of Discipline against Cleveland, one seeking a six-month suspension and one seeking disbarment. Because Cleveland never responded, the facts were treated as admitted. The Supreme Court of Georgia reviewed both matters together, found a pattern of client abandonment and rule violations, and decided disbarment was the appropriate punishment.

The court held that Cleveland's pattern of abandoning clients, failing to communicate, missing deadlines, misrepresenting case status, and ignoring the Bar's disciplinary process, combined with a prior disciplinary history and no mitigating factors, warranted disbarment rather than a lesser sanction.

Georgians who hired or relied on Cleveland, including a father fighting for custody and jailed defendants awaiting trial, were left without effective representation. The ruling reinforces that lawyers who abandon clients and ignore Bar investigations face permanent removal from practice, protecting future clients from similar harm.

Disbarred

1. Because Cleveland was properly served with both Notices of Discipline but never filed a Notice of Rejection, he was in default, meaning he waived his right to a hearing and all the factual allegations against him were treated as true.
2. The court found Cleveland committed multiple violations of the Georgia Rules of Professional Conduct, including failing to provide competent representation, failing to act with diligence, failing to communicate with clients, and misrepresenting the status of a client's case, which can be punished by disbarment.
3. The court applied the ABA Standards for Imposing Lawyer Sanctions, a framework courts use to weigh aggravating and mitigating circumstances, and found several aggravating factors: Cleveland's prior discipline, his pattern of misconduct across many clients, the vulnerability of incarcerated clients, his years of legal experience, and his failure to repay an unearned fee.
4. The court declined to treat Cleveland's failure to respond to the disciplinary investigation as a separate aggravating factor because that same conduct was already charged as a rule violation, and it found no credible mitigating factors since a claim about personal or emotional problems lacked any supporting evidence.
5. Comparing Cleveland's conduct to prior cases where attorneys who abandoned clients and defaulted in disciplinary proceedings were disbarred, the court concluded disbarment was the consistent and appropriate sanction here.

• attorney disbarment
• client abandonment
• State Bar of Georgia
• indigent defense
• default in disciplinary proceeding