Dusting off a penal code provision that applies specifically to lawyers, Hidalgo County prosecutors recently won a rare conviction against Corpus Christi attorney Eugene X. Mercier for conspiracy to commit barratry. On June 14, that conviction garnered Mercier a two-year state jail sentence probated for five years from Judge Mario Ramirez of Edinburg’s 332nd District Court. Several prosecutors say barratry cases rarely are brought against lawyers because they’re difficult to prove, as evidenced when the same Hidalgo County jury that convicted Mercier of conspiracy to commit barratry also acquitted the lawyer of four individual counts of barratry – the more serious of the charges he faced.
The jury’s April 18 conviction on the lesser conspiracy charge is notable because only a handful of lawyers in Texas have been indicted on any barratry-related charges in recent years, several prosecutors say. Most of those prosecutions failed.
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