ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, February 27, 1997 TAG: 9702270081
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: BOSTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
Joseph Stropnicky had taken care of the kids and done the housework during much of his 18-year marriage. So when he and his pediatrician wife split up, he wanted a divorce lawyer who had experience counseling homemakers.
Judith Nathanson fit the bill, but Stropnicky didn't fit hers: He was a man, and she only took women clients.
Now a state commission has ruled that Nathanson broke the law in refusing to represent Stropnicky. She was ordered to pay him $5,000 in damages for emotional distress.
``She never took the time to hear me out because I was a man,'' Stropnicky said Wednesday. ``That's really the definition of prejudice, to prejudge someone based on what category they're in.''
Tuesday's decision by the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination found that lawyers, like public accommodations, are subject to anti-bias laws. Nathanson had argued she had the right to represent anyone she chooses.
``An attorney or law office holding itself open to the public may not reject a potential client solely on the basis of gender or some other protected class,'' MCAD Chairman Charles Walker Jr. wrote.
Nathanson's office said she was on vacation and referred questions to her own attorney, who did not immediately return calls.
According to the ruling, Stropnicky had worked to support himself and his ex-wife, Dr. Paula Heimburg, while she went through medical school, then stayed home for seven years with their two children.
At the time of their divorce in 1991, Stropnicky testified, he was working as a biology teacher and making about one-tenth of Heimburg's $170,000 salary.
When he and his wife decided to divorce, the attorney drawing up the settlement suggested each retain a lawyer to review its terms. The attorney suggested Nathanson, among others, because she often represented wives in divorce cases.
``The issues in his divorce case were those that are typically associated with women,'' said Lynn Leonard, a former MCAD counsel who argued Stropnicky's case.
But Nathanson turned him down, first through a secretary, then by phone. In both cases, Stropnicky testified, he was told that Nathanson did not represent men in divorce proceedings.
Indignant, Stropnicky filed a suit with the MCAD in 1991.
During an MCAD hearing in 1996, Nathanson argued she had spent years building up a small practice that specialized in representing women in family and probate court.
By representing a man against a woman, she said, she would undermine her credibility with clients and the courts.
LENGTH: Medium: 57 linesby CNB