Lawyer in Vikings Sex Cruise Case Temporarily Loses License to Practice

An attorney who gained notoriety when he represented a Lake Minnetonka charter boat company on which almost a dozen Minnesota Vikings were accused of having a wild sex party in 2005 had his license temporarily suspended by the state last year.

Stephen P. Doyle’s license to practice law in the state was suspended for at least 90 days, effective last Oct. 5, after the Minnesota Office of Lawyers’ Professional Responsibility found that he had committed “professional misconduct” involving the conversion and theft of property belonging to a Wayzata law firm in which he was a partner.

Doyle’s request that his license be reinstated was granted, and he was “conditionally reinstated” on Tuesday.

According to state documents, Doyle was a shareholder in the Wayzata law firm of Robin, Thompson & Doyle from July 2003 until he left the company in March 2008. In April 2008, he and another attorney formed a new law firm, and in September 2008 they filed suit against Robin, Thompson & Doyle.

When Doyle left the first firm, he took property including an iPhone, a laptop computer and furniture, and failed to pay his share of the firm’s obligations. He also failed to honor the firm’s lien on a file that he took with him to his new firm.

In August 2010, a Hennepin County District Court judge found that Doyle had committed the illegal acts, and that they constituted conversion, civil theft and breach of fiduciary duties. The judge ordered that Doyle make restitution to the law firm.

Last April, Doyle filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy reorganization. The judgment to the law firm has not yet been satisfied.

As part of the disciplinary action against Doyle, state regulators ordered him to file an affidavit certifying that he is current in continuing legal education requirements.

In its reinstatement order, the Minnesota Supreme Court ordered Doyle to provide proof of his completion of the professional responsibility portion of the state bar exam by Sept. 21, 2012.

Doyle became nationally known in 2005 when he represented Al and Alma’s Supper Club and Charter Cruises of Mound, which provided the boat rented by the Vikings team members for the notorious “sex cruise.”

He was a frequent guest on national news programs in the wake of the incident, though it wasn’t his first time in the spotlight: He ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Minneapolis in the 1970s, and in the mid-1980s he made headlines when he represented his ex-wife, Scott County Attorney Kathleen Morris, who was accused of mishandling a child-abuse case in Jordan.