Nathaniel Strasser, 44, a former assistant public defender and assistant DA, requests probation to counter disciplinary counsel’s request for suspension of law license for year and a day.
An Erie lawyer is pleading for probation rather than a license suspension as discipline for being high on cocaine at a court hearing in 2022.
In making his case before the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the lawyer, Nathaniel Strasser, said he is in rehabilitation for drug addiction and that he erred in representing himself at a hearing before a disciplinary panel in September.
Strasser “recognizes that his self-representation was inappropriate and deficient,” the attorney who is now representing Strasser, veteran Erie lawyer Philip Friedman, said in a brief filed in the disciplinary case on Jan. 3. “He should have retained counsel.”
Also at the hearing in September, “evidence of his substance abuse history and treatment should have been admitted,” Friedman said in the brief, referring to Strasser. “The evidence was readily available and was highly relevant to the question of disposition.”
Strasser at the disciplinary hearing admitted to using cocaine ahead of the court hearing in 2022, but he denied being a drug addict. He said his use of cocaine enhanced his abilities as a lawyer.
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