Oregon State Bar
Disciplinary Counsel’s Office
P.O. Box 1689
Lake Oswego, OR 97035-0889
Attorney Merrill Schneider and Nicole Schneider
refusing to give claimant her property
in violation of the law, fiduciary duty to claimant
and harming claimant’s pursuit to obtain
Social Security Benefits
To the Disciplinary Counsel:
I am the attorney for *** ****. Claimant was represented at the OHA level by a legal aid type attorney and there is thus no attorney fee issue involved. Thereafter, claimant hired the law firm of Schneider Law Offices and they were paid by Social Security for their legal work pursuant to the Equal Access to Justice law 28 USC Sec. 2412(d).
On May 1, 2006 claimant terminated the law firm of Merrill Schneider and Nicole Schneider of Portland Oregon. The termination was made because of the insufferable rudeness of Nicole Schneider to the claimant, Schneider’s refusal to communicate with her client in violation of the Oregon Rules of Professional Conduct and Schneider’s refusal to send copies of the proceedings in Court and before Social Security as they occurred.
Indeed, claimant recently telephoned Schneider three times and never was permitted to talk to Schneider and finally told the telephone answerer that if Schneider did not communicate with her that she would fire Schneider. Schneider still did not communicate with claimant and she was thus fired.
Schneider admitted that her office is in chaos. Nicole Schneider said,
“there must be a miss-communication somewhere” when claimant told
Schneider that she had called so many, many times and never spoke with . Of
course, attorney Schneider is responsible for the incompetent work of her
staff and she cannot shuffle off the blame on her employees nor blame them for
her failure to communicate with her client
Claimant stated that the Schneider lawyers, “treat me like crud and then act nice when they want me back as a client.“ In her May 1, 2006 notice of termination claimant stated to the Schneiders the following:
As I have terminated this attorney/representative’s service I hereafter demand that my property, held in trust by this attorney/representative, namely all papers and document, notices, documents, questionnaires and correspondence and all medical records and any money given to this attorney/representative for expenses, be returned to me immediately, that is today. Any consent regarding my records is rescinded. Send me the original of my file and do not copy my file and do not retain a copy of my file.
{Exhibit One, incorporated by reference}
The case is long and complicated consisting of;
2003 Unfavorable Decision based on voluminous private medical records, the record of the hearing before OHA and apparently the tape and/or transcript,
a 2005 US District Court Remand Order and
a Notice from ODAR Chief Judge Tielens of upcoming re-hearing dated March 16, 2006.
There are complicated issues regarding claimant’s disability and it is not possible to trust claimant to be an accurate historian because she is taking medication for depression and pain which may cause her to forget which doctors she has been treated by, the dates, the locations, etc.
Claimant personally has paid for her medical treatment and its recordation either through cash, taxes or gifts from medical providers. She signed an agreement with Schneider that she is responsible for any costs to obtain medical records on her behalf.
Again, according to the Oregon Rules of Professional Conduct, the Schneider lawyers must surrender claimant’s property to her when they have been terminated and her medical records are her property.
But alas, even though this claimant is disabled, without a dime to her name and desperate, Merrill Schneider refuses to give up her property to her so her new attorney can swiftly learn the facts of the case, the events that have gone before and develop a strategy of the imminent new hearing that Judge Tielens foretells.
Merrill Schneider states that he disagrees, “that we have to give up the file…”
He goes on “we disagree…that we…not keep a copy.”
He sneers that claimant should travel to OHA (actually Office of Disability Adjudications and Review) and take a look at the file there, rather than actually return claimant’ property to her. He concludes by lecturing claimant, “we can’t operate a free copying service for you.”
{Exhibit Two, incorporated by reference}
By this letter, I seek to have Merrill Schneider and Nicole Schneider surrender claimants property to her. I further believe that the Schneiders should be disciplined for their unethical conduct that is both harming claimant’s rights to obtain Social Security benefits AND causing her much stress and anxiety in her weakened condition.
Claimant is seeking advise from members of the Oregon Bar regarding breach of fiduciary duty, theft, intentional infliction of emotional distress, replevin, among other claims against the Schneiders. I would guess that if claimant loses her case before the Social Security Administration that the damages could be quite high but I will of course leave such an issue to a member of the Oregon Bar who is retained. It would indeed be a pathetic sight to see this disabled claimant before the civil court in Oregon to obtain her property or filing a police complaint for stolen property against Schneider.
My duty is to obtain Social Security Disability benefits for my client and the unconscionable acts of Merrill Schneider and Nicole Schneider are delaying, hindering and indeed blocking my goal.
The medical records are the property of claimant and not the Schneider. He seeks to keep the medical records to impede her case to harm her in retaliation for firing him. He can’t be truthful in stating that he must keep the medical records for his fee petition unless he is going to go through the medical records and concoct and invent tasks that he did not do and time that he did not spend.
He could only wish to retain the records so that he can be dishonest with the Social Security Judge in his promised fee petition (even though he will be paid by SSA through the Equal Access to Justice law). If Schneider was being honest with the Social Security Administrative Law Judge in the fee petition he would produce contemporaneously created time records rather than “gun-deck” conjured up fee demands. His selfish goal of getting paid for services he will now “remember doing long ago” is not a sufficient reason to deny claimant her desperately needed property so she can prepare for her upcoming imminent hearing.
Schneider states that he will make keep her file even though claimant has rescinded his viewing of her private medical information, such rights codified in the HIPPA law. She has demanded that she retain some dignity in this disability ordeal so that Schneider return her medical treatment history instead of having her medical secrets “floating around” in Schneider’s admittedly chaotic law office and beyond.
Schneider finally guesses that “we don’t have anything in our files that either Ms. ****or you are entitled to that isn’t in the file at OHA. We suggest you copy the file at OHA (now ODAR). We cannot operate as a free copying service for you.”
So Schneider continues his incorrect belief that claimant’s property is somehow HIS property and that to make a copy for her, rather than give up her property to her, is somehow a revenue creating charge that this disabled pauper claimant must pay to him. It is as if Schneider stole a disabled person’s car and arrogantly demanded money to let the victim have it back.
Rather than return claimant’s now apparently stolen property, Merrill Schneider wants to have claimant pay her attorney $300 an hour to obtain a copy, or pay a copying service money to copy it, or have this disabled claimant travel to multiple locations to copy the file the SSA has or doesn’t have.
This makes several incorrect assumptions. First, the records are the property of claimant already and it is absurd for Schneider to demand that she go from doctor to doctor, hospital to hospital (if she could remember the dates and places with in her medicated and Schneider induced anxiety). Schneider expects this claimant to “guess” where her medical records are (at Falls Church Virginia, Richmond California, Portland Oregon?). He also demands that this disabled claimant trust that either she has a complete set of medical records and of the procedural background on this matter in her possession or that the Office of Disability Adjudications and Hearings has a complete record.
I have been an employee of OHA and know that often times records end up lost for weeks on end, misfiled and mixed with another claimant’s file. I also know what a burden it is on ODAR to have to find claimant’s file, either in Virginia, California, Oregon or wherever and produce it at the ODAR office in Oregon. Claimant should not have to guess that this file that has traveled perhaps from Oregon, to California, to Virginia, back to Oregon contains no missing documents. As a former employee of OHA, I know that regrettably when a file makes such a journey that oftentimes important records are simply lost, damaged or destroyed.
Again, Merrill Schneider has claimant’s property and refuses to surrender it in an obvious retaliation for firing him and places the risk of collecting a potentially incomplete file from various sources, place additional work and expense on ODAR to find the file, carve out time for her to copy the SSA file and thus deprive another claimant of that time, cause the government to spend money that it doesn’t need to spend to pay for the copying cost…all because Merrill Schneider refuses to follow his own Bar’s Rules of Professional Conduct and return client’s property.
Schneider’s duty under his state bar’s professional ethics code is black letter law-return the property to the client once you’ve been terminated.
Schneider’s duties before the Social Security Administration are likewise stunningly clear and strikingly violated;
§416.1540 Rules of conduct and standards of responsibility for representatives.
(a) Purpose and scope. (1) All attorneys or other persons acting on behalf of a party seeking a statutory right or benefit shall, in their dealings with us, faithfully execute their duties as agents and fiduciaries of a party. A representative shall provide competent assistance to the claimant and recognize the authority of the Agency to lawfully administer the process. The following provisions set forth certain affirmative duties and prohibited actions which shall govern the relationship between the representative and the Agency, including matters involving our administrative procedures and fee collections.
(2) All representatives shall be forthright in their dealings with us and with the claimant and shall comport themselves with due regard for the nonadversarial nature of the proceedings by complying with our rules and standards, which are intended to ensure orderly and fair presentation of evidence and argument.
(c) Prohibited actions. A representative shall not:
(4) Through his or her own actions or omissions, unreasonably delay or cause to be delayed the processing of a claim at any stage of the administrative decisionmaking process;
7) Engage in actions or behavior prejudicial to the fair and orderly conduct of administrative proceedings, including but not limited to:
(ii) Willful behavior which has the effect of improperly disrupting proceedings or obstructing the adjudicative process
20 CFR 416.1540
Instead of acting as a fiduciary to claimant, Schneider has instead blocked claimant in her 7 year struggle to obtain Social Security disability benefits to “pay her back” for firing him. He has refused to give up her property so she can prepare for the imminent hearing and she is desperate to obtain needed benefits but such may be delayed still further if she is forced to scurry from place to place to obtain what might be merely an in-complete record.
All of these hardships would be remedied if only Schneider would fulfill his duty as an officer of the court and a person obligated to obey the Oregon Rules of Professional Conduct and as a fiduciary to claimant as per Social Security regulation and immediately surrender claimant’s property to her and such an Order must issue that he do so.
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Daniel Bernath
|
Attorney
Merrill Schneider confesses that he repeatedly
lied
to a judge and the Oregon State Bar to get his lawyer
license. The truth, Merrill Schneider arrested for drugs in
Canada, and dropped LSD, intoxicated by illegal drugs for
many years of his law practice.
Lawyer
working for Merrill Schneider laughs at client because she is
poor 
Attorney
Merrill Schneider ignores six client phone calls in a month
Merrill
Schneider does nothing to speed up hearing, refuses to return 5
telephone calls