Supreme Court suspends attorney for missed briefs

Listen to this article

The Missouri Supreme Court has suspended a Kansas City-based appellate attorney who had several cases dismissed after she failed to file briefs.

The court entered an order of interim suspension for Allison Greer Kort of the Kort Law Firm on June 20 after the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel alleged that the Court of Appeals Western District dismissed at least of her five cases, including two juvenile matters, after giving her several extensions of the briefing deadlines.

The disciplinary case remains ongoing, but OCDC argued that an immediate suspension of Kort’s law license was warranted under a court rule in cases involving “a substantial threat of irreparable harm to the public.”

“While every effort will be made to bring expeditious resolution to Informant’s investigations, it is in the public’s best interest that [Kort] be prohibited from continuing to practice law while Informant’s investigations proceed,” David Brengle, a staff attorney for OCDC, wrote in the filing.

Kort asked the Supreme Court to rescind her suspension, but the court declined on July 5. In her motion, she alleged that she hadn’t received OCDC’s requests for information and that the first she learned of the complaints against her is when the suspension motion was filed.

James Morrow of Morrow Willnauer Church, an attorney for Kort, didn’t return a call seeking comment. In the motion, Morrow argued that Kort “acknowledges that she has missed several deadlines over the past few months” but since then “has take measures to ameliorate concerns with her previous scheduling practices.”

Morrow added that Kort had at least 14 cases pending both in Missouri and Kansas and that those clients would be “severely prejudiced” if they were forced to obtain new lawyers. According to court records, Kort has since withdrawn from her cases.

According to Kort’s website, she earned her law degree from the University of Texas in 1999. She was licensed in Missouri in 2017 and also is licensed in Kansas, North Carolina, California and Texas.

Prior to opening her law firm in 2017, Kort was a faculty member at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law from 2013 to 2015. She previously has served on the law school faculties at Duke University and Atlanta’s John Marshall School of Law.

The case is In re: Kort, SC100127.

Also:

Supreme Court disbars two Missouri attorneys

Lawyer’s suspension falls short of OCDC request

Supreme Court disbars attorney, suspends another after guilty pleas