LOS ANGELES — The State Bar Court of California recently issued a public reproval to Katerina F. Perreault, a Tarzana attorney, for misdemeanor criminal charges stemming from a “high level of intoxication.”
According to the Feb. 15 decision, Perreault attended a party on May 12, 2012, and left leave early due to her inebriated state. For undisclosed reasons, the decision states the attorney became increasingly angry upon her return home and began throwing and breaking things around the house. Perreault’s husband allegedly removed himself from the situation to contact authorities, but the situation continued to escalate upon his reentry to the household.
The decision states that her husband entered their garage and found Perreault seated in his car, and as he attempted to calm her, she scratched his arms and hands.
She eventually exited the vehicle and smashed their glass front door and a computer, the decision states.
Perreault then left the home and continued her tirade from various neighboring properties causing concerned homeowners to contact the local police, the decision states. She was later arrested, and she waived her Miranda rights.
On May 15, 2012, Perreault was charged with corporal injury on a spouse. Later, a charge of spousal battery added. She pleaded no contest to the domestic battery count. The corporal injury count was dismissed as part of a plea deal. For her criminal charge, Perreault was placed on a three-year probation and ordered to take a 52-week domestic violence course, among other things.
The California State Bar began its proceedings upon receipt of the plea.
The reproval decision states that Perreault faced sanctions at the trial court level for filing a "frivolous" motion to disqualify her then husband's attorney in a suit she filed against him in 2013. Perreault appealed the Los Angeles County Superior Court decision, but the Court of Appeal not only upheld the lower court sanction of $1,350, it also imposed an additional sanction of $5,000 for filing a frivolous appeal.
Perreault filed another two other suits in Los Angeles in 2014 and 2015, according to the reproval decision. They ended with courts dismissing those complaints with prejudice and with orders that Perreault pay defendants' attorneys' fees and costs of $13,368 and $6,800 respectively, in anti-SLAPP rulings.
The California State Bar reproval decision further states that Perreault has satisfied those sanctions and judgments.
Her license and eligibility to practice will not be affected, the decision states.
The Los Angeles County attorney has been a member of the California State Bar since 2005. She is a graduate of the Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu and had no prior record of discipline.
Editor's note: The original version of this story incorrectly stated that Katerina Perreault pleaded no contest to two charges. This and other reporting errors have been corrected. The Record regrets the errors.