MO Supreme Court suspends ex-KCPD lawyer’s license after he spread misconduct concerns
The Missouri Supreme Court this week indefinitely suspended the law license of the Kansas City Police Department’s former associate general counsel, saying his disclosures of confidential client information were not warranted or protected by the First Amendment or Missouri’s public employee whistleblowing statute.
Ryan McCarty violated the Rules of Professional Conduct for attorneys, the court said, and cannot apply for reinstatement for one year. The unanimous decision, it said, was made “to protect the public and the integrity of the legal profession.”
“Whether the disclosures were the acts of a disgruntled, recently terminated employee or of a dutiful public servant, McCarty knowingly disclosed client information in violation of his sworn duty of confidentiality,” said the July 22 decision, written by Chief Justice W. Brent Powell.
“No matter how noteworthy his disclosure may have been, it does not justify violating his sacred duty to his client. If a client cannot trust its lawyer to keep in confidence the information it has shared, then the legal representation is irreparably compromised.”
McCarty began working for KCPD as associate general counsel in June 2022, the court ruling said, and he and his supervisor — the department’s general counsel — “immediately had a fraught relationship.”
“McCarty believed the general counsel demeaned him, assigned him ‘grunt’ work, treated him like a ‘glorified secretary,’ and created a hostile work environment for himself and others who worked in the general counsel’s office,” the document said. “McCarty also believed he was ‘completely and unduly blackballed and ostracized from anything of importance’ and ‘stonewalled from anything going on in [the office of general counsel], or the Department more generally.’”
The court ruling said McCarty became concerned with numerous KCPD practices and procedures.
On his first day, it said, McCarty alleged he learned of a proposed policy to purge e-mails from KCPD’s systems after six months. He believed that if adopted, the policy could result in widespread open records violations. He also believed that the department mishandled Missouri Sunshine Law requests.
In early October 2022, the ruling said, McCarty filed a hostile work environment complaint with the police department. The complaint was closed the next month. At about that time, McCarty started sending e-mails to himself that contained detailed notes about his work and interactions with police department employees, the decision said.
He also saved e-mails and other documents that had been sent to his work e-mail and involved his representation of KCPD.
McCarty was fired on Dec. 7, 2022, after less than six months on the job.
Documents ‘will now be spread far and wide’
McCarty’s termination letter said he was fired because of “unsatisfactory performance during his probationary period,” according to the court ruling. He sent an e-mail to himself about his termination, writing that “I have all of the e-mails and associated records, and they will now be spread far and wide to reveal to the wider community just how bad things are at KCPD.”
The night he was fired, the court decision said, McCarty e-mailed two U.S. Department of Justice employees who were investigating allegations of discriminatory employment practices at KCPD. He told them that he was now able to speak out because he was no longer the department’s associate general counsel.
McCarty gave the Justice Department investigators the names of 10 people who he said had filed recent internal complaints of alleged discrimination, harassment and a hostile work environment against the general counsel. He also named four others “who have rightly complained of discriminatory conduct” and told the investigators to talk to all of them, the court decision said.
McCarty also suggested that the investigators file a Sunshine Law request to get his e-mails, which he said documented malfeasance within the department. Either that, the court filing said, or he “was more than happy to provide them upon request.”
Three days after he was fired, it said, McCarty sent 143 e-mail addresses and an eight-page “letter to the world” containing details of his concerns about the police department.
“The e-mail also included 372 pages of attachments consisting of internal e-mails and memoranda from his time at KCPD,” the court decision said. “E-mail recipients included the governor, state legislators, the attorney general, prosecutors, 5 public defenders, sheriffs, private attorneys, members of the media, and other individuals McCarty deemed ‘stakeholders’ of KCPD.”
The letter was critical of the interim police chief, the department’s general counsel, the Board of Police Commissioners and the entire department, according to the court ruling. It also called on the police board to get rid of certain employees.
“The attached documents included internal e-mails with legal advice provided by the general counsel’s office to KCPD about an array of topics and cases; detailed information regarding employees’ disciplinary investigations and the discipline each individual employee received; and McCarty’s detailed notes generated during his time at KCPD that he e-mailed to himself,” the court decision said.
‘Letter to the world’ claims malfeasance
McCarty’s “letter to the world” — written on police department letterhead that he had modified — received wide media coverage. In December 2023, the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel accused him of professional misconduct, saying he violated the rules that prohibit an attorney who previously represented a client to later disclose information relating to that representation or use it to that former client’s disadvantage.
McCarty responded in January 2024, admitting that he e-mailed Justice Department employees, wrote the eight-page letter and attached e-mails and memos regarding his time at KCPD, according to the court decision. But he argued that the attachments described conduct that was illegal or unethical and that “he acted as a whistleblower and believed his actions were allowed because they were in KCPD’s best interests and his ‘ultimate clients were the citizens served by the KCPD.’”
A disciplinary hearing panel found that McCarty had disclosed documents that involved his legal representation of a former client and recommended that he be reprimanded.
But the Office of Chief Disciplinary Counsel asked that the Missouri Supreme Court suspend McCarty’s law license with no chance to apply for reinstatement for a year.
The judges did just that.
While the First Amendment and Missouri’s whistleblower statute may prohibit KCPD from taking action against McCarty, the decision said, they don’t prevent the court from disciplining him.
“McCarty swore an oath to conduct himself in accordance with the Rules of Professional Conduct,” it said. “He breached this oath. He is subject to the appropriate discipline, and neither the First Amendment nor Missouri’s whistleblower protections shield him from this Court taking such action.”
