Attorney Ordered To Return Excessive Fees To Screwed Over Client Fails To Show Up To Court, Becomes Target Of Bench Warrant

In Miami, Florida, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports:

• A federal judge [...] ordered the arrest of a New York lawyer accused of bilking a South Florida client out of $275,800 then abandoning him after a guilty plea.
  
  Emmanuel Roy didn't show up at the federal courthouse in Miami for Friday afternoon's contempt hearing, an absence that was not taken lightly by U.S. Magistrate Judge William Turnoff. Although he stopped short of finding Roy in contempt of court, Turnoff issued a bench warrant for the wayward attorney. "He is going to be arrested and brought before me," Turnoff said.
  
  Roy and another attorney, Peter Mayas of Plantation, were ordered earlier this year to return the excessive legal fees to the family of Patrick Coulton, a Coconut Creek man who was arrested in March 2008 on federal drug and money laundering charges. With the attorneys present, Coulton pleaded guilty four months after his arrest. He is serving a seven-year sentence.
  
  The payments came in the form of cash, jewelry, a Porsche and a Coconut Creek townhouse. After the guilty plea, according to court documents, the attorneys ditched the client.

For more, see Miami federal judge orders arrest of NY lawyer (Pair of attorneys accused of bilking, then abandoning Broward client).