TALLAHASSEE (Florida Record) — Fort Myers attorney Joseph Patrick Gaeta has been indefinitely suspended following a June 20 Florida Supreme Court order regarding allegations he abandoned his law practice, according to a recent announcement by The Florida Bar.
"According to a petition for emergency suspension, Gaeta appeared to be causing great public harm by abandoning his law practice and clients' legal matters," the state bar said in its July 31 announcement of the discipline and the Supreme Court's order. "He also failed to protect his clients' interests."
Gaeta's suspension was effective 30 days from the date of the court's three-page order.
Florida court orders are not final until time to file a rehearing motion expires. Filing such a motion does not alter the effective date of Gaeta's suspension.
Gaeta was admitted to the bar in Florida on Dec. 31, 2002, according to his profile at the state bar website. No prior discipline before the state bar is listed on Gaeta's state bar profile.
In March the state bar intervened "after it was brought to the bar's attention that [Gaeta] had abandoned his practice, had not paid his office rent for a number of months, and had ceased communicating with clients and his landlord," the state bar's 14-page petition for emergency suspension said.
An inventory attorney appointed by the state bar soon found 14 unsettled cases, all and filed with expired statute of limitations and one case with an expired statute of limitations but with Med-Pay funds held in a trust account. The inventory attorney also turned six client files over to clients in those cases and handed a remaining eight client files over to the state bar, according to the petition.
Gaeta's clients were advised to contact the state bar or a malpractice attorney and one of those clients, who hired Gaeta's father, Joseph R. Gaeta, to handle a personal injury case in September 2011, filed a complaint with the state bar in May, according to the petition. Joseph Patrick Gaeta took over the case in November 2012 but the last communication the client "had with anyone from the Gaeta law firm was in September 2013," the petition said.
That client "is still suffering from the injuries he sustained and no longer has legal recourse," the petition said.