What is the impact of alcohol abuse on the determination of professional misconduct?

It is important, however, to emphasize that evidence of successful rehabilitation continues to be important and relevant in appropriate cases. When evidence of alcohol abuse at the time of an attorney's professional misconduct is coupled with evidence that the abuse was addictive in nature and causally contributed to the misconduct, and when the attorney demonstrates a meaningful and sustained period of successful rehabilitation, such evidence should be considered as a factor in mitigation of disciplinary sanctions. (See Gary v. State, supra, 44 Cal.3d at p. 828, 244 Cal.Rptr. 482, 749 P.2d 1336.) Of these three elements--alcoholism, causality, and recovery--petitioner has satisfactorily demonstrated only the first two. The third element--recovery, or rehabilitation--naturally involves consideration of the attorney's history of alcohol-related behavior, including any alcohol-related misconduct.

According to a consensus of the medical community, alcoholism is a treatable disease. (See Sundance v. Municipal Court (1986) 42 Cal.3d 1101, 1114-1115, 232 Cal.Rptr. 814, 729 P.2d 80.) Through continued abstinence, an alcoholic may arrest the deleterious manifestations of the disease. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are recovering alcoholics, completely abstinent from alcohol or other mind-altering chemicals. (Alcoholics [50 Cal.3d 368] Anonymous World Services,

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