South Carolina Lawyer Suspended Over Facebook Posts About George Floyd

A South Carolina lawyer had his license suspended for six months over controversial Facebook posts he made about George Floyd.

The Office of Disciplinary Counsel had received 46 complaints about lawyer David Paul Traywick after he made public statements on Facebook that included foul language and incited racial violence, The Charlotte Observer reported.

South Carolina’s Supreme Court suspended Traywick’s license for six months and ordered him to take a diversity class and an anger management assessment with a licensed therapist before getting his license back.

It was during the racial unrest that ignited following Derek Chauvin murdering George Floyd when Traywick took to Facebook to vent his frustration. The nation was in an uproar with an onslaught of Black Lives Matter protests across the country that sparked a worldwide movement. Confederate monuments were destroyed, buildings and blocks were vandalized, and many took to the streets to denounce racial and social injustice amid an international health pandemic.

“Here’s how much that (expletive) life actually mattered,” Traywick wrote on Facebook. “Stock futures up. Markets moved higher Monday and Tuesday. (Expletive) you. Unfriend me,” he added.

In the posts, Traywick identified himself as an attorney and referenced his law firm. The justices felt Traywick’s post could have further ignited the racial conflict at the time, not only among his Facebook friends but in the Charleston community, The New York Post reported.

Traywick’s posts “intended to incite and had the effect of inciting gender and race-based conflict beyond the scope of the conversation Respondent would otherwise have with his Facebook ‘friends,’” the justices said.

It was determined that the lawyer’s controversial posts “tended to bring the legal profession into disrepute” and violated the Lawyer’s Oath, which requires lawyers to “maintain the dignity of the legal system.”

Traywick admitted to the posts and agreed to the six-month suspension, the Associated Press reportsed.