Hoosier Enquirer: Indiana’s Attorney Disciplinary Commission Exposed AGAIN—Criminal Courts Do Their Job Better

Criminal lawyers were first unethical, but the Commission missed them while focusing on politicians and other low-hanging fruit.

When a Martinsville lawyer, James Wisco, and former city council member admitted to stealing more than $160,000 from his own clients, the hammer of justice fell from where it always does—the criminal courts.

Attorney Wisco pleaded guilty in April 2025 to seven felony counts of theft. He was sentenced to prison and probation, and the public finally saw accountability, but the Supreme Court gave him a law license and shouldn't they be held accountable for their incompetence in licensing and regulating?

So, let's be honest, only after the guilty pleas and sentencing did the Indiana Supreme Court step in to suspend his law license. They rarely step in before the local cops and prosecutors?

Before that, Wisco had already been allowed to drift along, “administratively suspended” for failing to keep up with continuing legal education and for ignoring the Disciplinary Commission. In other words, the watchdog had been asleep while the thefts piled up. Until then all they do is fleece lawyers for taking classes, how stupid?

This case exposes the uncomfortable truth: Indiana’s criminal justice system is more effective at policing lawyers than the very agency created for that purpose. Local police, prosecutors, and trial courts investigated, prosecuted, and convicted Wisco. The Attorney Disciplinary Commission, meanwhile, shuffles papers and issued toothless reprimands, selectively, until the criminal courts forced their hand. Or they go after high profile people who practice law for a notch on their belts or to make an example and scare the bejesus out of the bar members. In otherwords, they flex their exclusive authority, which should be illegal.

This journalist learned of one case where the Commission prosecutor accused a witness of having an abortion when she had a miscarraige so that she could cover up having sex with her lawyer, now husband of 6 years, when she seperated from her first husband. They disbarred her husband essentially for marrying his client many years earlier. That is just how evil Seth Pruden was.

If Indiana really wants to protect the public, the solution is simple. Stop pretending the Commission is a meaningful safeguard. Put it in the criminal code: when a lawyer is convicted of a crime, their license is automatically suspended until the Supreme Court orders otherwise. No drawn-out disciplinary theatrics, no protection for insiders, no second chances for those who exploit their clients. It is time to create as system where every grievance gets heard by a a client-attorney mediator as a gatekeeper before any legal actions occurs.

The Wisco saga also highlights broader failures. Lawyers who are criminals, alcoholics, drug addicts, or struggling with untreated mental illness are left in practice until disaster strikes. Meanwhile, the Commission is run by a small cadre of Indianapolis bureaucrats who claim moral authority but operate more like a guild protecting its own. Most could never survive in real-world practice, and their selective enforcement undermines public confidence. When they do practice the exit the revolving door and defend lawyers aganst the commissiton of crazy high fees and get paid to teach the legal ethics credit courses at law schools and to lawyers at the Continuing Legal Education course the Commission mandates and punish lawyer who fail to attend timely. Busy lawyers don't need CLE it only hurts the many clients they earned in the marketplace by being so good.

Hoosiers deserve better. The Supreme Court in Indiana is broken; the criminal justice system has proven it will do the job of investigating wrongdoing, bringing charges, and delivering punishment.

The Commission, on the other hand, has proven it cannot. Until reform comes, the public’s best line of defense against bad lawyers is to call the police and prosecutors—not the disciplinary bureaucracy that has failed to earn the trust of the very people it is supposed to protect. When they do file complaints they are returned un-investigated most of the time. This is a selective process which targets a few and protects others, mostly who attended IU's Law Schools--that is what people are asking questions about. We have no stats but it is clear that most of the legal powers in Indiana did go to Indiana University or one it's two law schools or both.

Oh yeah, many also teach there too for money. Chief Justice Loretta Rush was teaching at Purdue for big money she left of her own ethics reports. What happened to her?

Gov. Braun needs to step in.