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FLORIDA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Pembroke Pines attorney who pleaded no contest in drug case disbarred for keeping $9,000

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Pembroke Pines attorney Marcy Elizabeth Abitz has been disbarred following a May 25 Florida Supreme Court order for allegedly keeping $9,000 mistakenly mailed to her by an insurance group.

Abitz deposited and spent most of the money within days of receiving it, according to a 138-page petition for emergency suspension filed by the Florida State Bar with the state supreme court. The insurance group e-mailed Abitz about the error, to which Abitz said she would investigate and then ignored all further communication requests with insurance group, the petition said.

In addition to being disbarred, Abitz was ordered to $375-per-month restitution for 24 months to the insurance group.

Earlier this year, Abitz was suspended following a plea to various drug charges filed against her in Broward County in late 2015.

The state bar announced the discipline and the supreme court's order June 29.

Abitz was admitted to the bar in Florida on Dec. 16, 2002, according to her profile at the state bar website. Her discipline history dates to April 2016 when she was suspended by order of the state high court for contempt and failing to respond to an official bar inquiry into a complaint filed by a former client in the fall of 2015, according to documents filed with the court by the bar.

In August 2016, the state Supreme Court handed down an emergency suspension until further order against Abitz. Abitz was suspended again by order of the state court in September 2016 for contempt, noncompliance and failure to respond to an official state bar inquiry into complaints of another former client, according to documents filed with the court by the bar in that matter.

On March 3, 2017, the state bar filed a notice of determination or judgment of guilt, citing various drug charges filed against her Dec. 1, 2015, in the 17th Judicial Circuit in Broward County. Those charges were one count each possession of methamphetamine, oxycodone, oxymorphone, cocaine and drug paraphernalia. 

Abitz later entered a plea of no contest to four third-degree felonies and one first-degree misdemeanor in the case and on Nov. 30 was sentenced to six months probation concurrently on each count, according to the notice. The state Supreme Court handed down another suspension, also dated March 3, 2017.

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