The rules governing attorney trust accounts exist for one reason: to protect clients from the moment their money enters an attorney’s possession until the moment it reaches its intended destination. Those rules are not suggestions. They are the minimum floor beneath which no licensed attorney is permitted to operate, regardless of how long they have practiced, how many clients they have served, or how clean their record may otherwise appear.
Jianming Shen practiced immigration law in Glen Cove, New York for more than two decades. During that time, he handled a real estate transaction involving nearly $3 million in client funds. He did not hold those funds in a proper attorney trust account. He used personal and business accounts instead. He did not maintain the required bookkeeping records — and had not since the year he was admitted to the bar. He made false statements to at least eight clients and third parties about the status and availability of those funds. And when he registered annually with the Office of Court Administration, he certified that he was in compliance with Rule 1.15 — a certification that the court found was false.
On February 10, 2026, the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Judicial Department publicly censured Shen. The court found that his misconduct involved poor bookkeeping, commingling, and negligent handling of client funds — and that while there was no intent to convert, no proven client harm, and no dishonest motive at the core of the conduct, the pattern of false statements and systemic recordkeeping failures across more than two decades demanded a formal public accounting.
Jianming Shen: New York Immigration Attorney Publicly Censured for Commingling Nearly $3 Million in Client Funds and Making False Statements
Attorney Accountability Series | New York Disciplinary Coverage | February 2026
Quick Facts
Attorney: Jianming Shen New York Bar Admission: 2002 Address: Glen Cove, NY 11542 Practice Area: Immigration Law Case No.: 2024-07408 Department: First Judicial Department, New York Supreme Court Appellate Division Grievance Committee: Attorney Grievance Committee for the First Judicial Department Referee: Appointed March 2025 Total Charges Filed: 11 Charges Sustained: Charges 1–4, 5, 7–9, 10, 11 (all except portions originally dismissed by Referee) Discipline: Public Censure — February 10, 2026 Client Funds at Issue: Nearly $3 million (real estate transaction) Core Findings: Commingling personal and client funds; false statements to at least 8 individuals; failure to maintain bookkeeping records since 2002; improper non-refundable fee agreements; false OCA registration certifications Rules Violated: NY RPC 1.4(a)(5), 1.5(d)(4), 1.15(a), 1.15(b)(1), 1.15(b)(2), 1.15(d)(1)(i), 1.15(d)(1)(ii), 1.15(d)(2), 4.1, 8.4(c)
Overview
On Tuesday, February 10, 2026, the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Judicial Department publicly censured attorney Jianming Shen following disciplinary proceedings initiated by the Attorney Grievance Committee for the First Judicial Department. Shen faced allegations of professional misconduct stemming from his handling of client funds. Florida Politics
The case involves a pattern of conduct that stretched across the entirety of Shen’s legal career — from his admission to the bar in 2002 through the disciplinary proceedings that concluded in 2026. The core failures were systemic: no proper trust account, no compliant bookkeeping records, false statements made repeatedly to multiple people, and annual false certifications to the court’s own registration system. None of these failures were a one-time lapse. They were the baseline from which Shen practiced law for more than twenty years.
For the full record of New York attorney disciplinary actions in 2026, see the ALABnews New York disciplinary coverage page.
The Charges: Eleven Counts Across Three Categories
The Attorney Grievance Committee brought forth a petition containing eleven charges against Shen, alleging that he commingled personal and client funds and made false statements to at least eight individuals. The charges specifically cited violations of Rules 1.4(a)(5), 1.5(d)(4), 1.15(a), 1.15(b)(1), 1.15(b)(2), 1.15(d)(1)(i), 1.15(d)(1)(ii), 1.15(d)(2), 4.1, and 8.4(c) of the Rules of Professional Conduct. Florida Politics
The charges fell across three broad categories of misconduct:
Category One — Client Fund Handling (Rule 1.15) Rule 1.15 of the New York Rules of Professional Conduct is the foundational safekeeping rule. It requires attorneys to maintain client funds in a separate attorney trust account, to keep complete and accurate records of all deposits and disbursements, to promptly notify clients when funds are received on their behalf, and to promptly deliver funds to which clients are entitled. The multiple sub-provisions of Rule 1.15 charged against Shen reflect the comprehensive nature of his failures in this area: he violated the basic separation requirement, the recordkeeping requirement, the notification requirement, and the prompt delivery requirement.
Category Two — False Statements (Rules 4.1 and 8.4(c)) Rule 4.1 prohibits attorneys from making false statements of material fact or law to third parties. Rule 8.4(c) prohibits conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation. The AGC charged that Shen made false statements to at least eight individuals — clients and third parties — about the status and availability of client funds.
Category Three — Fee Agreements and Registration (Rules 1.4(a)(5) and 1.5(d)(4)) Rule 1.5(d)(4) prohibits non-refundable fee agreements in New York. Rule 1.4(a)(5) requires attorneys to advise clients of their right to seek other counsel before agreeing to any limitation on the scope of representation.
The Real Estate Transaction: Nearly $3 Million in Client Funds
The allegations centered on Shen’s handling of nearly $3 million in client funds related to a real estate transaction. He was accused of using personal and business accounts to hold these funds and making false statements to clients and third parties. Florida Politics
The use of personal and business accounts — rather than a properly maintained attorney trust account — to hold nearly $3 million in client real estate funds is one of the most fundamental violations in the New York disciplinary system. Rule 1.15 exists precisely because client funds must be kept separate from an attorney’s own assets at all times, tracked with complete and accurate records, and available on demand. When client funds flow into a personal or general business account, they become commingled with the attorney’s own money. The client’s legal ownership of those funds becomes practically impossible to verify, trace, or protect.
The false statements Shen made to at least eight clients and third parties about the status and availability of those funds compounded the underlying commingling violation. Clients who asked where their money was, when it would be disbursed, or whether it was available received false information — a direct violation of both the duty of communication and the prohibition on dishonest conduct.
The Referee’s Findings
In March 2025, the Court appointed a Referee to conduct a hearing on the charges and issue a report with findings and a recommended disciplinary sanction. The Referee’s report sustained all charges except for charges five, ten, and eleven, recommending a public censure. Florida Politics
The AGC sought an order confirming the Referee’s report on charges one through four and six through nine, while disaffirming the dismissal of charges five, ten, and eleven. Shen opposed the disaffirmance and requested the Court to confirm the Referee’s dismissal of those charges, urging a less severe sanction than suspension. Florida Politics
Shen’s strategy in the disciplinary proceeding was to limit the scope of the findings — arguing that the three charges the Referee had dismissed should remain dismissed, and seeking a sanction less severe than suspension. He was partially successful on the sanction question. He was not successful on the scope of the findings.
The Court’s Ruling: All Eleven Charges Sustained
The Court confirmed the Referee’s findings sustaining charges one through four and seven through nine. These charges involved commingling client funds with personal funds, failing to maintain required bookkeeping records, and making false statements of fact to clients and third parties regarding the status and availability of client funds. Florida Politics
On the three charges the Referee had dismissed, the Appellate Division disagreed:
The Court disaffirmed the Referee’s dismissal of charges five, ten, and eleven. Charge five, related to falsely certifying compliance with Rule 1.15 in his Office of Court Administration attorney registration, should have been sustained because Shen did not maintain the required bookkeeping records for his business account since 2002. Charge ten, concerning non-refundable fee agreements, was deemed impermissible under established law. Charge eleven, related to conduct reflecting negatively on his fitness as a lawyer, was also sustained. Florida Politics
The charge five finding is particularly significant. Every year, New York attorneys are required to register with the Office of Court Administration and certify their compliance with Rule 1.15. Shen had not maintained required bookkeeping records since 2002 — the year he was admitted. Yet he had been certifying annual compliance throughout that entire period. That is not an oversight. It is a false statement made annually to the court’s own administrative system, repeated year after year for more than two decades.
The Sanction: Public Censure
Ultimately, the Court publicly censured Shen, citing that his misconduct involved poor bookkeeping, commingling, or negligent handling of client funds without intent to convert, client harm, or dishonest motive. Florida Politics
The court’s reasoning on the sanction reflects the three factors that distinguished Shen’s case from cases warranting suspension or disbarment: no intent to convert client funds for his own use, no demonstrated actual harm to any client, and no finding of a dishonest motive at the core of the conduct. In this respect, the Shen case sits at a very different point on the misconduct spectrum from the cases covered elsewhere in this publication’s New York series — the grand larceny scheme of Terrance J. Dougherty, the complete non-cooperation of Lamon Darrell Bland, or the total default of Jamie T. Ferrara.
That said, a public censure is not a private warning. It is a formal finding of professional misconduct, entered on Shen’s disciplinary record, published in the court’s official decisions, and accessible to any client, court, or bar who searches his name. The eleven sustained charges — covering commingling, recordkeeping failures, false statements, improper fee agreements, false registration certifications, and conduct adversely reflecting on fitness — represent a comprehensive accounting of systematic professional failures spanning his entire career.
The finding also parallels — though in a different jurisdiction and with a different outcome — the conduct for which Dawn Marie Calache of Port Orange, Florida received a public reprimand in the Florida Bar’s January 2026 disciplinary cycle: supervision failures leading to improper handling of client funds, without a finding of intent to steal. In both cases, the disciplinary system drew a meaningful distinction between negligent mishandling and intentional misappropriation — and calibrated the sanction accordingly.
The Rule 1.15 Framework
New York’s Rule 1.15 is one of the most detailed and strictly enforced provisions in the Rules of Professional Conduct. Its requirements include maintaining a separate trust account at a New York financial institution, keeping complete records of all deposits and disbursements, reconciling the account regularly, retaining records for seven years, notifying clients promptly when funds are received, and delivering funds to clients promptly when they are entitled to receive them.
The annual OCA registration requirement — under which Shen repeatedly certified false compliance — is administered by the New York State Unified Court System. Every New York attorney must register biennially and certify compliance with the Rules of Professional Conduct as a condition of maintaining their license. Certifying compliance when one is not in compliance is, on its face, a false statement to a judicial body.
Members of the public who believe they have been harmed by an attorney’s improper handling of funds in New York may contact the New York Lawyers’ Fund for Client Protection — which compensates clients who suffer financial losses due to the dishonest or negligent conduct of New York attorneys — or file a complaint with the Attorney Grievance Committee for the First Judicial Department.
Members of the public who wish to verify any New York attorney’s current license status may search the NYS OCA Attorney Search portal.
For a comprehensive overview of how New York attorney discipline works from complaint through final sanction, the NYSBA Guide to Attorney Discipline (2023) provides the most thorough public reference available.
Disciplinary Timeline
2002 — Shen admitted to New York State Bar; begins using personal and business accounts for client funds; fails to maintain required bookkeeping records from the outset of his practice 2002–2024 — Shen certifies annual compliance with Rule 1.15 in OCA attorney registration; certifications are false Pre-2024 — Shen handles real estate transaction involving nearly $3 million in client funds through personal and business accounts; makes false statements to at least 8 clients and third parties regarding status and availability of funds; enters into impermissible non-refundable fee agreements 2024 — Attorney Grievance Committee for the First Judicial Department files petition with 11 charges (Case No. 2024-07408) March 2025 — Appellate Division, First Department appoints Referee to conduct hearing and issue report May 2025 — Referee files report; sustains charges 1–4 and 6–9; dismisses charges 5, 10, and 11; recommends public censure 2025 — AGC moves to confirm Referee report on sustained charges and disaffirm dismissal of charges 5, 10, and 11; Shen opposes disaffirmance and urges sanction less than suspension February 10, 2026 — Appellate Division, First Department confirms charges 1–4 and 7–9; disaffirms dismissal of charges 5, 10, and 11; sustains all 11 charges; publicly censures Shen Current Status — Licensed; public censure entered on disciplinary record; all 11 charges sustained
