Convicted of nothing, attorney agreed to be disbarred. Maybe it was the restroom videos
A Florida attorney agreed to a disbarment by consent after the law protected him from prosecution on 123 counts of voyeurism.
The law didn't protect Pasco County's James Stanton Jr. from the Florida Bar's consequences. On Monday, the Bar released its monthly report of discipline handed down by the Florida Supreme Court. Stanton’s new to the discipline report after a clean record since joining the Bar in 1999.
His criminal record also remains clean, despite the 142 videos a computer tech allegedly found on Stanton’s computer when Stanton worked as Tampa’s MaintenX Management’s chief financial officer and corporate counsel in 2010. Stanton kept working at MaintenX until his 2014 arrest.
The Bar complaint alleges, “Between Feb. 1, 2010, and June 30, 2010, (Stanton) installed and/or used covert video/audio recording devices in the restrooms and shower areas on the premises of MaintenX Management, Inc. The equipment secretly recorded adult female employees while they engaged in activities included dressing, undressing, showering, and/or privately exposing their bodies.”
As the complaint states, “The women had a reasonable expectation of privacy in utilizing the restrooms and/or shower areas.”
One of the videos allegedly showed Stanton going into the women’s restroom, removing a hidden camera and walking out with it.
Five civil lawsuits from women allegedly filmed remain pending in Hillsborough County.
Though the technician Jeremy Lankowski says he told MaintenX about the videos in 2010, Bar discipline documents say law enforcement wasn’t notified until 2014. A still-pending Lankowski lawsuit against MaintenX and Stanton said the company did nothing after he informed it of the videos, not even telling the women involved. Stress from the situation, the lawsuit claims, drove Lankowski to quit in 2013.
Stanton eventually was arrested on those 123 counts of misdemeanor voyeurism. But, as the disbarment by consent order states “The charges against (Stanton) were dismissed because the applicable statute of limitations had run.”
The case was expunged from the court system.
The order states that Stanton admits that those allegations, if proven, would be a violation of four Bar rules. So, he agreed to permanent disbarment via a disbarment on consent. The Florida Bar rules explain disbarment on consent this way:
"A respondent may surrender membership in The Florida Bar in lieu of defending against allegations of disciplinary violations by agreeing to disbarment on consent. Disbarment on consent shall have the same effect as, and shall be governed by, the same rules provided for disbarment elsewhere in these Rules Regulating The Florida Bar."
This story was originally published May 3, 2018 at 12:11 PM with the headline "Convicted of nothing, attorney agreed to be disbarred. Maybe it was the restroom videos."