Kelowna lawyer Kimberly Dawn Rule fined $15,000 for professional misconduct

Kelowna lawyer Kimberly Dawn Rule has been fined $15,000 and ordered to pay the Law Society $1,000 in costs for professional misconduct.
 
 In a joint submission to a Law Society Tribunal hearing panel, Rule admitted that between November and December 2022 she failed to provide the quality of service required of a competent lawyer when acting in a wills and estates matter for a 101-year-old client who was suffering from progressive dementia. She admitted that she did not provide the client with complete and accurate relevant information about the matter, did not properly assess the client’s ability to retain and instruct her, and did not obtain and record instructions from the client. Rule admitted that she failed to decline to act for the client when she knew or ought to have known that the client lacked the capacity to retain and instruct her. 
 
 In accepting the joint submission, the Law Society Tribunal took into consideration an Agreed Statement of Facts, Rule’s admission of professional misconduct, and the range of sanctions imposed in previous similar cases. 

The full decision of the hearing panel is available here.