An attorney caught giving what ended up being bad advice to a client is being sued by the attorney he allegedly impersonated in 2004 when Plainville police called to find out who had told a client to enter their house during a police search. In the lawsuit filed last week, attorney Wesley Spears alleges that attorney Joseph Elder impersonated Spears following the arrest of a suspected marijuana grower.
According to the lawsuit, Elder spoke with his client on his cell phone and advised him that he could enter his home on during a police search on July 26, 2004. The client, Erik Krajweski, “entered the premises which resulted in one of the officers getting hurt.” Then, according to the complaint, when police went to apprehend Krajweski they found him flushing marijuana down the toilet. Once in police custody, police questioned Krajweski’s rationale for disobeying their order not to enter the house. Krajweski, according to the lawsuit, told police his attorney instructed him that he could enter the house. But not wanting to get his lawyer in trouble Krajweski refused to give police his name. Instead, the lawsuit claims that Sgt. Dean Cyr tried to identify the attorney by using Krajweski’s cell phone. Court records state that Cyr called the cell phone number posing as a prospective client. “The person identified himself as Attorney Wes Spears,” but according to Spears’ lawsuit, the cell phone in question belonged to Elder at the time. When Cyr called a second time and the man who answered identified himself at Spears, and at that time Cyr told him he was going to apply for an arrest warrant and file a complaint with the state grievance committee. The grievance committee’s complaint against Spears has been dismissed for lack of probable cause, but he claims the damage to his reputation has already been done. The lawsuit says that numerous newspaper articles were already published that alleged “police believed the plaintiff engaged in unethical and/or criminal conduct.” As a result the plaintiff was subjected to “emotional distress, humiliation, loss of reputation.“Spears is also suing Elder for defamation, slander, libel, legal malpractice, and fraud. Elder was unable to be reached for comment late Friday before the start of the holiday weekend.
