What was he thinking? According to SeattlePI, Former Washington attorney Bruce Hawkins was arrested for a fraudulent debt elimination scheme. He told clients that national banks could not lend credit so consumers did not have to pay their credit card debt. If that wasn’t bad enough, he formed Commercial Arbitration Forum, Inc. (CAFI) to arbitrate cases. He was CAFI’s sole shareholder and sole arbitrator. So, of course, he ruled in favor of his clients providing them with “awards” to use in court to eliminate the debt. After a financial-services corporation obtained a temporary restraining order against CAFI prohibiting him from conducting any more arbitrations in that debtor’s case, Hawkins sold CAFI business to a non-lawyer friend and demanded a percentage of income generated by the business. He never disclosed his financial interests in CAFI or the new business. To view the discipline notice and the additional ethics violations by Bruce Hawkins, click here.

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