Case library / Discipline that arrives from somewhere else
Psychology board probation reaches a second license
In short
Licensed Educational Psychologist license revoked, the revocation stayed, and three years of probation imposed. The supe
$2,000.00The 30-day duty to report the first board’s discipline became its own cause for discipline.
It is the cleanest illustration of the two-for-one problem: one set of clinical facts produced discipline on two licenses, plus a separate charge for saying nothing about the first.
What happened
The respondent had held a Licensed Educational Psychologist license from this Board since July 1, 2002. She also held a psychologist license from the Board of Psychology.
On March 28, 2024 the Board of Psychology resolved a first amended accusation against her by stipulated settlement: her psychologist license was revoked, the revocation was stayed, and she was placed on four years of probation. The allegations behind it were that she committed gross negligence in treating two patients between 2018 and 2019; committed repeated negligent acts in treating those patients; committed a dishonest, corrupt, or fraudulent act in misrepresenting to a patient who her assistant was and what authority that individual had; committed unprofessional conduct by failing to timely produce records to the Board of Psychology; committed repeated negligent acts in treating an 11-year-old patient between 2019 and 2020; and committed unprofessional conduct by failing to promptly transmit that patient’s independent educational evaluation report within 15 days after receiving written requests for it from the patient’s father.
A regulation requires a licensee of this Board to report any disciplinary action by another licensing entity within 30 days. As of April 28, 2024, she had not reported the psychology discipline to this Board. The Board filed its accusation on June 11, 2024, with two causes: the fact of the other board’s discipline, and the failure to report it.
She was served on June 13, 2024, timely filed a notice of defense contesting the accusation, and was represented by counsel. The matter settled. She agreed that at a hearing the complainant could establish a factual basis for the charges and gave up her right to contest them, without admitting them. The Board adopted the stipulation on June 24, 2025.
What it was charged as
Denial, revocation, suspension, restriction, or any other disciplinary action imposed by another state or by any other governmental agency, on a license to practice educational psychology or any other healing art, is itself unprofessional conduct. A certified copy of that action is conclusive evidence of it.
Requires a licensee to report to the Board within 30 days any disciplinary action taken by another licensing entity or authority of this state, another state, a federal agency, or the United States military. Charged in conjunction with B&P §4989.54 as unprofessional conduct.
The outcome
Licensed Educational Psychologist license revoked, the revocation stayed, and three years of probation imposed. The supervised practice condition is deemed satisfied by the supervised practice she is already doing under the Board of Psychology probation.
OAH No. 2024070097
$2,000.00ordered in cost recovery under B&P §125.3What the rule actually says
If you hold more than one license or registration in the healing arts, discipline on one is, by statute, unprofessional conduct on the others. The second board does not relitigate the underlying facts: a certified copy of the first decision is conclusive evidence of the discipline. Separately, and independently, you have an affirmative duty to report that discipline to every board that licenses you, within 30 days. The clock starts with the other agency’s action, not with the date the second board finds out, and the failure to report is charged as its own cause for discipline, carrying its own consequences even if the derivative discipline would have arrived anyway.
Discussion
Analysis, not part of the decision
This Board was not deciding whether she was negligent with her patients between 2018 and 2020. Those allegations were resolved by the Board of Psychology, and the statute makes a certified copy of that decision conclusive evidence of the discipline. The proceeding here is derivative by design. Once the first decision exists, the only real questions for the second board are what consequence follows on the second license and whether the licensee met her own reporting duty.
The second cause is the one entirely within a licensee’s control. The psychology discipline became effective March 28, 2024 from a settlement she had personally signed. Thirty-one days later, on April 28, 2024, the report had still not been made, and the Board pleaded it. That is the trap: the reporting deadline falls in the exact period when a licensee is most absorbed by the first case and most likely to assume everyone already knows.
The remedy shows some coordination between the two agencies. Her supervised practice condition here is expressly deemed satisfied by the supervision she is already performing under the psychology probation, so she is not paying twice for the same hour. She is, however, paying $2,000 in cost recovery to this Board, plus $1,200 a year in monitoring, on top of whatever the psychology probation costs. Her educational psychology probation runs three years and the psychology probation runs four, and either can be extended automatically if a new pleading is filed against her during the term.
For anyone doing educational assessment work, the underlying allegations are worth reading on their own. Two of the six concern records rather than treatment: failing to produce records to the regulator, and failing to transmit an independent educational evaluation report within 15 days of written requests from a parent. Turnaround obligations on assessment reports are a real disciplinary exposure and rarely feel like one at the time.
Where insurance reaches, and where it does not
Professional liability coverage does not respond to a derivative disciplinary action of this kind; the loss is the license, not a claim by a client, and the misconduct alleged in the first proceeding included a dishonest or fraudulent act, which every policy excludes. The license defense benefit will normally pay counsel for a board proceeding, but many policies apply a single sublimit per policy period, so a licensee facing two boards over the same events can exhaust it on the first and pay for the second herself. Read the sublimit and the aggregation language before you need them.
What would have changed it
- If you hold a second license, certificate, or registration, calendar a written report to every board that licenses you on the day any discipline becomes effective, and send it with proof of delivery.
- Assume the second board will learn of the first board’s action; the failure to report is a separate charge that you control entirely, unlike the underlying discipline.
- When you settle with one board, negotiate knowing a second proceeding is coming, and ask whether the second board’s conditions can be made to run concurrently with the first, as the supervision term was here.
Questions
For a law and ethics seminar, or for yourself
- A certified copy of another board’s decision is conclusive evidence of that discipline. If a licensee believes the first board got the facts wrong, what is genuinely left to argue in the second proceeding, and where should that argument be aimed?
- The 30-day reporting duty ran from an order the respondent had signed herself. What system would you build in a solo practice so that a self-reporting deadline survives the distraction of the case that created it?
- Her probation here is three years while her psychology probation is four, with the supervision term shared between them. What are the arguments for and against boards formally coordinating overlapping probations, and who bears the cost of the current arrangement?
Source. This write-up is drawn from the signed public decision in the case number above. Names, cities and employers have been removed — why. To pull the original, open the Board's quarterly newsletter archive, find the issue covering July 24, 2025, and match the case number in the Formal Disciplinary Actions section. Not legal advice.
