LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The Kentucky Bar Association has asked the state Supreme Court to hold suspended lawyer Eric Deters in contempt for defying the court’s orders to stop practicing law.
In an 18-page motion filed Wednesday, the bar said other than standing in front of a jury, Deters has “continued to act as a practicing attorney” despite his suspension eight years ago.
The motion says on the very day Deters was denied reinstatement last June, he told the court in a video on his “Bulldog Show” that “I don’t need a law license to make a living in law. You can’t stop me.”
In another video, he boasted to prospective clients: “I’m able to work on your case no matter what. So when you come to Deters Law, you get the bulldog and the team that I assembled.”
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Deters could be fined or even jailed if he is found in contempt, The Courier Journal reported earlier this week in a story that showed how he had masterminded two so-far unsuccessful federal lawsuits seeking to block vaccination mandates for employees at hospitals in Northern Kentucky and Cincinnati.
Deters said the motion is "total bull----" and that "I am not in contempt of anything.
"I am going to keep doing what I'm doing," he said. He also said a law firm is allowed to use a "retired lawyer's name."
He previously told the newspaper that bar officials and the court could "go f--- themselves.”
The motion says Deters has violated Supreme Court rules — and its order that he “cease any and all activities relating to the practice of law” — by continuing to operate Deters Law in Independence, Kentucky.
"There is no licensed attorney named 'Deters' in the firm managed by respondent called 'Deters Law,'" the motion says.
It also says “a large sign bearing the words 'DETERS LAW OFFICE' continues to be displayed outside the firm’s office."
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The motion also says Deters' claim he is simply an office manager or paralegal there is a sham.
"(Deters) does not work for other lawyers. He works through them. His own words reveal he is not a subordinate but in control of the processes, decisions and functioning of a law practice that bears his name."
Filed by bar counsel Jane Herrick, the motion says Deters continues to manage and advertise Deters Law and to solicit clients, draft pleadings and give legal advice. And she says “he has no intention to stop.”
Deters will have 10 days to respond.
Deters is a conservative firebrand and supporter of former president Donald Trump who hosted a pro-Trump rally on his farm Sept. 11 that featured Fox News personalities Tomi Lahren and Kimberly Guilfoyle, who has dated Donald Trump Jr.
The Courier Journal reported that Deters casts himself as a “legal outlaw” and once called Kentucky bar officials "jokes of human excrement" and the Kentucky Supreme Court "the seven dwarfs."
Refusing to reinstate him in June, that court said he had a “notorious propensity” for filing malicious and frivolous lawsuits and seemed unable to control himself.
"Deters’ practice of law is not governed by constitution, rule of law or procedure,” the court said. "It is anarchy."
Dismissing the motion filed by Deters Law for an injunction blocking the hospital vaccine mandate, a federal judge in Cincinnati ripped the firm for presenting “unsupported conspiracy theories” and criticized Deters himself for “confessed judge shopping.”
Andrew Wolfson: 502-582-7189; [email protected]; Twitter: @adwolfson.
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