Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz — shown in a new Quinnipiac University poll as the front-running candidate for attorney general — obtained a 50-percent exemption from a state lawyers’ fee in 2006 on the basis that she didn’t “engage in the practice of law as an occupation,” records show.<\/p>\n
“I do not engage in the practice of law as an occupation,” says the official state form that Bysiewicz signed. The form also says: “I hereby certify that the information provided herein is true and correct.”<\/p>\n
That exemption form, dated May 22, 2006, meant Bysiewicz paid only half of the normal $110 fee that lawyers and judges must pay each year into the state judicial department’s “Client Security Fund,” which compensates people for losses due to lawyers’ misconduct or mistakes.<\/p>\n
But that small savings of $55 may have political significance. Although this was the only year out of 11 that she claimed the partial exemption — and her campaign spokeswoman said Friday that Bysiewicz will correct what she described as a mistake in filling out the wrong form in 2006 — it may undercut Bysiewicz’s argument that her 11 years in office should count as the “active practice” of law.<\/p>\n
It is a key argument for Bysiewicz. State statutes require that Connecticut’s attorney general have “at least 10 years’ active practice at the bar of this state,” but a few critics have said that she does not meet that “active practice” requirement even though she has been registered as an attorney here for 23 years.<\/p>\n
Before she became secretary of the state in 1999, she had worked for eight years for two law firms and a corporation’s legal department – six of those years in Connecticut. She says all her years in office should count as “active practice” because although she doesn’t need to be a lawyer in the job, she and her staff dispense legal advice on laws affecting elections and corporations.<\/p>\n
She requested a legal opinion Wednesday from Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, but he has not yet responded.<\/p>\n
Taking the 50-percent exemption for 2006 didn’t save Bysiewicz any money personally, by the way – because she has state taxpayers foot the bill for her annual Client Security Fund fees, as well as those of more than a half-dozen staff lawyers in her office.<\/p>\n
That contrasts with the policy of Blumenthal, whom she hopes to replace as attorney general. He is not seeking re-election as he runs for the U.S. Senate.<\/p>\n
“We do not pay for our attorneys’ client security fund fees,” Blumenthal said Friday. His office employs about 200 lawyers. “We feel that taxpayers should not have that burden” for the lawyers’ individual fees, Blumenthal said.<\/p>\n