Kristen Toland, Esquirette | SUSPENDED

New Jer­sey.  Hear Ye! Hear Ye!

On this date, in the Gar­den State, the Supreme Court of New Jer­sey sus­pended Kris­ten K. Toland based upon her sus­pen­sion in the Com­mon­wealth of Penn­syl­va­nia for a period of one year and one day.

Ms. Toland pled guilty in the Supe­rior Court of New Jer­sey, Mer­cer County to an accu­sa­tion charg­ing her with the crime of assault by auto, in vio­la­tion of N.J.S.A. 2C:12-1c(3), a third degree crime, as a result of dri­ving while intox­i­cated and caus­ing seri­ous bod­ily injury to three other indi­vid­u­als. Addi­tion­ally, Ms. Toland engaged in gross neglect, lack of dili­gence, fail­ure to com­mu­ni­cate with a client, and con­duct prej­u­di­cial to the admin­is­tra­tion of jus­tice in Pennsylvania.

Ms. Toland’s license to prac­tice law was sus­pended on Sep­tem­ber 10, 2007 for a period of 12 months (New Jer­sey is softer than the Penn­syl­va­nia “hard asses.”

Richard J. Engel­hardt, Esquire appeared before the Dis­ci­pline Review Board for the Office of Attor­ney Ethics. Ms. Toland failed to appear. Per­haps she got to talk­ing to some­body at the bar and for­got about her appoint­ment with the Supreme Court of New Jersey?

Are the indi­vid­u­als injured in the auto­mo­bile acci­dent okay?  Do they believe jus­tice has been served in this case?  Has ade­quate resti­tu­tion been made?

Were any of Ms. Toland’s clients injured as a con­se­quence of her actions?  If so, are those who were injured sat­is­fied with the dis­ci­pline imposed in this case?  Has resti­tu­tion been made?

Have there been any other instances of mis­con­duct by Ms. Toland that haven’t been addressed by Office of Attor­ney Ethics?