AUGUSTA — A once-disbarred attorney has been suspended from practicing law for six months following complaints that he failed to adequately represent two clients and was improperly added as a beneficiary to an elderly client’s will.
The suspension of Andrews Bruce Campbell of Bowdoinham begins Nov. 1.
The agreement imposing the suspension was approved following a brief hearing Tuesday before Maine Supreme Court Associate Justice Donald Alexander at the Capital Judicial Center.
The complaints against Campbell were filed by Catherine A. Gero, Matthew Fleury, and Wanda Moulton.
Campbell’s attorney, Justin Andrus, and attorney Alan Kelley, representing the Board of Overseers of the Bar, which regulates attorney conduct, had crafted a proposed order for the court.
Campbell acknowledged his wrongdoing and agreed to the sanction.
At the hearing, Gero told the judge she wanted a longer period of suspension.
While Campbell’s suspension is in effect, he is barred from accessing client files and open cases are to be returned to clients or placed with Andrus for safekeeping, according to the order.
Campbell, 73, has been the defense attorney in some high-profile trials in central Maine, including the defense of Raymond Bellavance Jr., who was convicted of setting fire to the Grand View Topless Coffee Shop in Vassalboro in 2009.
Campbell began practicing law in Maine 43 years ago.
Campbell’s first reprimand from the Board of Overseers, in 1987, involved a case in which he defended Dennis Eugene Friel, who was accused of defacing 30 churches and a town hall during the summer of 1983. Campbell insisted he was following his client’s directions by standing mute and refusing to cross-examine the state’s witnesses at Friel’s jury trial. The judge declared a mistrial, and later the charges against Friel, who has since died, were dismissed.
Campbell was suspended and finally disbarred following a conviction, also in 1987, in U.S. District Court in Maine for marijuana distribution. He was reinstated conditionally in 1999 and fully in 2001.
Campbell was reprimanded again for his professional conduct in 2006 and 2010.
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