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On Friday afternoon, I received this document from Mata’s dad: Reply of Harry L. Howe To Respondent’s Response to Motion to Quash.

For completeness, here’s the full set of docs this relates to::

• Harry Howe Motion to Quash
• Gingras Response to Motion to Quash
• (see also Gingras Motion to Compel)
• Harry Howe Reply ISO Motion to Quash

After reading this latest thing from Mr. Howe, all I can say is — yuck. I just feel SO sad it’s come to this. And I’m sad that a lawyer with 50 years of experience feels the need to sink to this level. It’s honestly so disappointing.

Being a lawyer really is a privilege (even though it’s technically not). Lawyers are supposed to be held to a higher standard…at least in the professional sense (and NO – Jim Lee is wrong when he says lawyers don’t have the same free speech rights as everyone else).

The bottom line is this — as lawyers, we are supposed to be honest. We are supposed to be focused on seeking truth and ensuring justice is done. We are supposed to be open/honest/candid, and never intentionally deceptive.

That’s why when Jim Lee asked me for a complete copy of Laura’s file, my immediate response was: “Sure, here ya go.”

When Jim Lee said he wanted to take my deposition, my answer: “Anytime.”

I didn’t object. I didn’t obfuscate. I didn’t need to. Because I have nothing to hide.

But not everyone shares that view. Exhibit A — Mr. Harry Howe.

Rather than focusing on the issues and speaking the truth, Mr. Howe seems intent on doing everything he can to hide the truth. Keep in mind – I assume he will claim his daughter did nothing wrong. In that case, he should be HAPPY to talk to me….because then he could help me understand why I got this SO wrong. And I have said this 1,000 times — if I got this wrong, I will IMMEDIATELY apologize.

But instead of showing me why I’m wrong, we get nothing but evasiveness and a lack of candor from Mr. Howe. Why act like you’re hiding something unless you really are hiding something?

Issue #1 — he tries to insult me for having a UPS Store as my mailing address. Well guess what? Yep – Mr. Howe’s mailing address is also a UPS Store. Unbelievable.

Issue #2 — Mr. Howe continues trying to paint me as an asshole because I had him served with a subpoena at 8:30 PM on the day compliance was due (and like I said before, I did NOT ask my process server to go to Mr. Howe’s home that late at night).

He makes it sound like this was intentional, and he absolutely implies I was unreasonable in refusing to give him additional time to respond to the subpoena.

No honest person who knew all the facts would agree with Mr. Howe.

To begin, I tried reaching out to Mr. Howe via text last year. See below. Obviously, this is the number listed on his AZ Bar profile, so I have no idea if it’s a cell phone or a landline. If it’s a landline, then he never got the message. But at least I tried.

UPDATE – as I was writing this, on a hunch I checked Mr. Howe’s number on this site which says this IS a landline: https://www.phonevalidator.com/

No idea if that’s accurate, but assuming it is, then I understand why no response was ever received.

After I didn’t hear back from Mr. Howe, I sent him a very friendly letter in late February.  Included with that letter was a copy of the subpoena. I sent this as a courtesy so he would know well in advance that a subpoena was coming. I both MAILED the letter AND had a copy hand-delivered with the subpoena.

And, of course, the subpoena itself had a footnote that said if the compliance date was too short, all Mr. Howe had to do was ask for more time and I would give it automatically. SO UNREASONABLE!

Oddly, in his Motion to Quash, Mr. Howe mentions my letter, but then he failed to give a copy to the judge, because “the complete letter is not attached, because it contains statements and allegations not properly before this disciplinary body.”

HUH? What?

Looking back now, I think Mr. Howe didn’t want the judge to see my letter, because it shows I was polite, professional, and above all else — I was trying to make this easy for  Mr. Howe. I literally told him I did NOT want to put him through a formal deposition. I suggested we could simply have a man-to-man phone conversation, like normal people.

Instead of doing that (because it appears he doesn’t want me to know the truth), Mr. Howe has tried to paint me as a crazy person. I dunno, take a look at my letter and tell me if you think anything I said here was unreasonable. And just consider this closing line:

Having said all this, please understand one thing – I am not angry at either you or your daughter. This is not about personal revenge. This is about seeking the truth, and protecting the rule of law. As a lawyer who has been around a lot longer than me, I sincerely hope you share my view that protecting the legal profession requires knowing the truth. That is all I ask from you.

If asking a witness to tell the truth makes me unreasonable, that’s a badge I will wear proudly.