RUMFORD — The Board of Overseers of the Bar for the state of Maine has removed Rumford attorney Melanie A. Allen from the active guardian ad litem roster for the state’s courts’ system for multiple rules violations, including failing to report a disciplinary action taken against her last year.

Allen, who graduated from the University of Maine School of Law in 2017 and was admitted to the Maine bar later that year, is a self-employed attorney at Swift River Legal on Congress Street.

In September, Allen was the subject of a hearing before the Board of Overseers Guardian Ad Litem Review Board, following a complaint that she had engaged in misconduct under the state’s guardian ad litem rules.

Guardians ad litem are appointed by the courts to advocate for a person’s best interest in legal matters, which most often involve family and custody issues.

According to hearing records, a complaint was filed against Allen in November 2023 by counsel for the Guardian Ad Litem Review Board based on her failure to report a 2023 disciplinary action by the Board of Overseers of the Bar to the courts and to her clients. That discipline was a formal admonition issued by the Board of Overseers that she missed a scheduled hearing date in a custody matter and later failed to file required witness and exhibit lists to the court or opposing counsel.

In 2019, Allen represented a client seeking to modify a post-divorce judgment on parental visitations, and later withdrew from that case.

In 2020, Allen once again represented the same client in a family and protection matter, which included another request to modify parental rights stemming from the underlying protection case. While representing that client, Allen failed to appear at a pretrial status conference on March 9, 2021.

During the bar’s investigation into the complaint against Allen, she acknowledged that her office had received notice to attend the conference on that date, but that she failed to record or note that date in any of her files or records. When asked, she could not remember why she failed to appear, noting that behavior was unusual for her.

As that case continued, Allen received notice of another hearing scheduled for March 8, 2022 — almost a year later to the day — for which she was supposed to have submitted witness and exhibit lists, but didn’t remember whether she had sent those to the court or to opposing counsel, and could offer no documentation that she had done so.

Without the witness and exhibit lists, Allen was “unable to present what she believed would have been sufficient evidence” in her client’s case on the scheduled hearing date. The client, who was offered an opportunity to testify on her own behalf but chose not to, then decided to withdraw her motion to modify parental rights and responsibilities and her motion was dismissed.

Then, according to the board’s investigation, “placement and other rights and responsibilities as to the minor child of the parties was ordered to resume under the provisions of a prior controlling order, which included time with the child’s father” that Allen’s client had been trying to change.

In her defense, Allen told investigators that she had been dealing with a busy practice at the time, and had some staffing issues and difficulties with her remote practice, but has since hired a staff person and implemented digital resources to improve her ability to organize and keep track of the demands of her practice.

Based on its investigation, on July 14, 2023, the Board of Overseers found that Allen’s violations of the Maine Rules of Professional Conduct had compromised her client’s case.

She has since taken full responsibility for her misconduct, according to investigators, and has fully acknowledged her lack of diligence and competence, and understands that her conduct negatively impacted her client. She has also taken remedial measures in her practice to ensure similar incidents do not happen in the future.

When that finding of misconduct was recorded and the admonition issued, Allen was supposed to report the disciplinary action to the counsel to the Maine Bar, to the courts and to all parties on all cases in which she was appointed at the time that the disciplinary action was pending and at the time of the final ruling.

Allen was aware of the mandate, according to investigators, based on an email she sent in May 2023 to a guardian ad litem services coordinator with the administrative offices of the courts, who had directed Allen to report the disciplinary petition to the Board of Overseers of the Bar. Several months later, Audrey Braccio, counsel to the Board of Overseers, sent an email to Allen requesting her compliance in reporting the disciplinary petition.

Allen did not respond to that request.

A month later, board staff contacted Allen again by phone asking her to comply, and she said she would that day, but did “not respond that day or thereafter,” according to investigators.

In October, board counsel again reached out to Allen by email seeking compliance, but that email was never opened. Several weeks after that, board counsel sent a certified letter to her requesting her to comply with the disciplinary disclosure rule.

Allen responded to that request, noting she’d received the prior communications and that she was aware of her duty to disclose, although became aware “late in the process,” but that her “work for families in Maine takes priority over compliance with the rules” which govern that work.

In her response, Allen provided none of the requested documents, and asked investigators to take into account the heavily overburdened system “in which we work” and that the “families and those of us seeking to guide them are faced with staggering shortages of resources at every turn.”

Allen acknowledged she failed to inform the Board of Overseers of the complaint, while noting that it was a complaint with which the board was already “clearly familiar,” and asked the board to consider her belief “that I have succeeded in representing the best interests of those children involved and consider it to be a higher priority” than the “technical aspects of my role” to report disciplinary actions.

Days later, a formal complaint was sent to Allen outlining her failures to respond, which she did not respond to. She was ultimately disciplined for those failures and for failing to provide requested documents of her prior disciplinary admonition.

The board had an option to reprimand Allen rather than remove her from the roster, but that “although there was fortunately no injury to a child in this case, the Board finds that there was injury to the public and to the court,” that Allen had acted intentionally to disregard the board’s requests and orders, that her misconduct was not minor and that it was likely to recur in the future.

The board’s finding maintains Allen’s continued obligations to report her prior discipline to the courts and to any clients she has represented during this period of time.

Allen’s license to practice law is unaffected by the review board’s decision.

She did not respond to an email from the Sun Journal seeking comment.