Veteran Richmond area attorney Rhetta M. Daniel is challenging the authority of the Virginia State Bar to consider misconduct charges against lawyers in a filing that, if upheld, could undermine decisions in hundreds of previous cases.

Her attorney, Henry E. Howell III, issued the challenge in a memo filed with the State Bar ahead of a scheduled hearing Thursday on the 74-year-old lawyer’s alleged violations of rules governing attorneys.

Mr. Howell wrote that the General Assembly has never authorized the State Bar or its disciplinary board “to impose any penalties on a licensed attorney for professional misconduct and certainly not license revocation. …

“The only authority that the General Assembly has granted to the Virginia State Bar is the authority to investigate and report attorney misconduct,” Mr. Howell wrote on behalf his Ms. Daniel, whose 42-year-career includes stints as a deputy commonwealth’s attorney in Henrico County and as one of the State Bar attorneys who handled discipline cases.

In response, lawyers for the State Bar argue that the disciplinary board has been granted its authority to hear and decide misconduct cases by the state Supreme Court. The bar’s lawyers also argue that Ms. Daniel’s filing should be dismissed as being submitted too late.

However, Mr. Howell notes that the state’s highest court does not appear to have any legal authority to grant the State Bar and its disciplinary board such authority based on the current statutes.

His memo notes that the State Bar, to which all attorneys must belong to practice law in Virginia, is not a court or a corporation and has not received General Assembly recognition as a state agency.

He notes that the State Bar is only authorized to act as an administrative agency of the Virginia Supreme Court. He argues that it is “a private entity, not a governmental entity” and thus lacks the power to “impose any penalties on a licensed attorney.”

The issue is considered likely to require a decision from the state Supreme Court.