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Arrest warrant issued for retired lawyer accused of stealing from disabled client

A warrant has been issued for the arrest of a retired Connecticut lawyer who has been accused of stealing money from a disabled former client.

Newington, Connecticut, police have issued the arrest warrant for Michael Schless, 78, now of Boynton Beach, Florida, the Hartford Courant (reg. req.) and the Connecticut Law Tribune (sub. req.) report.

Police refused to discuss the charges until the warrant has been served, but Schless has been the subject of a lengthy investigation into whether he took thousands of dollars belonging to a former client with cerebral palsy.

Schless, who has denied wrongdoing, declined to comment when contacted by a reporter Thursday, the Law Tribune reports.

However, Michael Romano, a lawyer for Schless, told the Courant his client plans to return to Connecticut to face the charges, whatever they may be. Another lawyer for Schless has attributed the allegations of theft to a bookkeeping problem.

Schless was the subject of a 2013 story in the Courant detailing allegations that as a probate-court-appointed conservator for a man with cerebral palsy, he may have stolen as much as $100,000 from the man and tried to cover it up by filing false accounting statements.

David Ruth, a lawyer for Schless’ former client, John Fritz, accused Schless of using Fritz’s money “as if it was his own.”

“I think what he did was awful,” Ruth told the Courant. “His job is to protect the interest of a disabled person and instead he used it for his personal expenses.”

Schless was removed as conservator for Fritz in 2012 after Fritz’s half-brother and sister-in-law hired Ruth to look into Schless’s handling of Fritz’s finances. Fritz also has a lawsuit pending against Schless and a New Jersey-based insurance company that posted a $45,000 probate bond for him.

Schless voluntarily resigned from the Connecticut state bar last year after lawyer disciplinary authorities accused him of failing to safeguard funds in connection with a conservatorship and of failing to respond to requests for information.