A Crown Point lawyer is facing a state disciplinary complaint accusing him of leaving clients in limbo last year after he fell out of touch for months.
Samuel Berkman missed court in over 60 cases from January 2024 to January 2025 for misdemeanors or low-level felonies, according to the Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission complaint filed May 21. A handful of clients filed grievances after they were repeatedly not able to reach him.
Berkman could not be immediately reached by phone or text. A woman who answered at his firm said he was not currently practicing law and another lawyer had taken over his cases.
Documents note he wrote in response to grievances that he was in a car crash in May 2024 and wasn’t able to work.
Aside from professional discipline, the commission is recommending Berkman repay costs from their investigation, Executive Director Adrienne Meiring wrote.
She wrote Berkman should have promptly quit cases, instead of having clients show up in court not knowing where he was, or having other lawyers periodically cover for him.
In one case, one man, a longtime client, retained Berkman for a driving on a suspended license charge in March 2024. By May, he found the lawyer moved to a new office, which was vacant and still being remodeled.
The man showed up for his May 21, 2024 hearing alone. Berkman hadn’t done “any substantive work” on the case, according to the report. His $350 legal fee was eventually refunded.
A second man paid $2,500 for Berkman to represent him in an operating while intoxicated case in Porter County in March 2024. By May, the lawyer said he couldn’t represent him and promised to refund the money. After the man filed a grievance, it was refunded in October.
Another woman said she paid Berkman $700 for a driving without car registration case and still hasn’t been refunded.
The report noted hearings were rescheduled when Berkman didn’t show up for four cases in Lowell Town Court in May 2024 and 21 cases in Schererville Town Court in November 2024.
By late 2024, a Porter County judge issued a contempt of court citation. Another followed in Lake County – both as a bid to get him to show up.
When the citation was dismissed in Lake County in January, he told the Post-Tribune that his father had recently died.
mcolias@post-trib.com
