Diane L. Karpman

Diane L. Karpman has been a leading figure in the realm of lawyer ethics and discipline for decades.

The ink was barely dry on her State Bar membership card when she was assigned to teach contract law at Western State University College of Law in 1975.

She was also appointed as a State Bar Court Referee. In that capacity, she disbarred more than a few lawyers.

“You don’t go to law school for three or four years with the high possibility of failing the notoriously difficult California bar examination because your goal was to become a mastermind in a criminal organization,” she said.

Honing those skills led her to become one of the most sought-after expert witnesses in the field of professional responsibility and a highly regarded international speaker in the area.

Karpman spent seven years as an expert witness working with federal prosecutors who were pursuing the prominent securities class-action firm of Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes & Lerach for operating a kickback scheme to induce potential plaintiffs to sue.

She currently works out of her home office and ​​is highly selective about her cases and is only taking those of great interest to her or which present unusual issues. She no longer feels the obligation to defend all trust account violations.

At times, Karpman has advised clients as diverse as the U.S. Department of Justice and Tom Girardi, but won’t comment on them.

She is also known for her column, Ethics Byte, which published in the California Bar Journal for 15 years, routinely expressing her opinion on everything ethical or not.

For example, explaining that “if Tony Soprano really wanted protection, he would only hire a California lawyer because of their enhanced duty of confidentiality.”

Karpman also served as the president of the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers in 1999-00 and as president of the Beverly Hills Bar Association in 2013-14. She has served for about three decades on the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s ethics committee.