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Ethics

Legal Ethics Forum

Covering Legal Ethics

Post Frequency: 11.2/day

Last Entry: August 14, 2020 at 13:23:48

The lawyer's role in the first year curriculum

Posted on August 25, 2009
I take it as a very good sign for the direction of legal education that UC-Irvine's new law school is requiring its entering students to take an interdisciplinary course exploring the lawyer's role. Here's the description: Law 507A - Legal...

North Carolina Central makes more good news

Posted on August 25, 2009
I'm always looking at how the legal profession excludes new entrants, and what purpose is served by the exclusion. One of the fascinating law schools to watch is North Carolina Central, whose graduates pass the bar at such rates that...

Welcome to Our Newest Co-Blogger, Professor Stephen Gillers

Posted on August 24, 2009
I am delighted to welcome Professor Stephen Gillers as our newest co-blogger. (His first post appears below.) As many readers of this blog know, Stephen is the author of numerous important books and articles on legal ethics, is a frequently...

The 10 Worst Cases in Lawyer Regulation: Nominations Please

Posted on August 24, 2009
For a talk at an upcoming ethics conference at the University of Akron School of Law, I decided to write about the Ohio Supreme Court's Rancman opinion, which not only rejected litigation funding as champerty and maintenance, but used rather...

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Odds and ends (August 23, 2009)

Posted on August 23, 2009
Here's an article about James Moliterno, a PR prof who travels the globe, consulting on legal ethics. . . . . More legal ethics fall-out from the saga of Kwame Kilpatrick, the former mayor of Detroit. . . . ....

NY Criminal Defense Lawyers Convicted of Attempted Witness Tampering

Posted on August 21, 2009
After six days of jury deliberations, a federal jury in Brooklyn has convicted a prominent New York criminal defense attorney (Robert Simels) and his associate on multiple federal felony counts, including attempted witness tampering. The testimony in the case brought...

Law professors on Professor Yoo and tenure

Posted on August 21, 2009
In the wake of the statement by the Dean of UC-Berkeley Law School, Christopher Edley, about whether the school will look into Professor Yoo's tenure, the New York Times collects views here (including from our own Brad Wendel), the UC-Berkeley...

Ninth Circuit holds that in-house lawyer had retaliatory discharge claim under Sarbanes-Oxley

Posted on August 21, 2009
Opinion here. Story here.

California appellate court affirms common interest doctrine; protects work product shared with co-defendants; DQs firm that hired lateral

Posted on August 20, 2009
Meza v. H. Muehlstein & Co.

England's proposals for alternative business structures (?ABS?) (= MDP)

Posted on August 20, 2009
I just received an email from James Hutchinson of the Legal Services Board in London, stating as follows: Please find attached a ?discussion paper? on ?Alternative Business Structures? which went out for consultation here in England. It was issued by...

Which cause lawyers control the case? (Gay rights lawyers not allowed to intervene in Prop 8 challenge)

Posted on August 20, 2009
In the constitutional challenge to California's Prop 8 (barring same sex marriage), the judge denied a request by gay rights lawyers to intervene in the case and granted an intervention request by the City of San Francisco. Story here. I...

Teach Legal Ethics in Kosovo

Posted on August 19, 2009
Seriously. This program sponsored by the ABA's Rule of Law Initiative is seeking legal ethics teachers to spend 6-12 months working on legal education reform in Kosovo: American Bar Association, Rule of Law Initiative-Kosovo, Legal Education Reform Specialist (6-12 months,...

Firm didn't represent individual officers; malpractice claim tossed

Posted on August 19, 2009
We've so often seen claims by organizational agents (e.g., officer, directors, employees) that the organization's law firm represent the agent personally. Sometimes the courts have great sympathy for those claims; sometimes not. In this case, no sympathy.

Improper arguments in the news

Posted on August 19, 2009
Two eye-catching news stories deal with improper arguments by trial counsel: (1) the Ninth Circuit's reversal of the conviction of Gregory Reyes for back-dating options; and (2) a trial court judge's decision to tack on $40 million in damages that...

Seinfeld, Vermont, and Rule 1.6

Posted on August 18, 2009
In the memorable last episode of Seinfeld, the lead characters get arrested in Massachusetts and sent to jail for failing to help someone who was getting carjacked. The storyline seemed a little far fetched, but then again, it was Seinfeld....

What I did on my summer holidays

Posted on August 17, 2009
To be fair this is not what I did on my summer holidays, but "what I did for work this summer" isn't quite as catchy. In any event, what I did was read Tim Dare's wonderful new book, Counsel of...

Textron decision on work product privilege

Posted on August 17, 2009
On August 13 the first circuit released an en banc decision on whether material not prepared for litigation but which "relates to a subject that might or might not occasion litigation" fall within the work product privilege (here). The materials...

Court Strikes Down Several Louisiana Advertising Rules

Posted on August 17, 2009
A federal district court has held that several provisions of Louisiana's advertising rules, which were to take effect in October, are unconstitutional. The opinion is here. The provisions that were struck down were Rules 7.5(b)(2)(C) (containing a requirement to disclose...

ILEC4: Panel on Duty of Loyalty and Conflicts of Interest

Posted on August 12, 2009
[Here's a proposed session for the Fourth International Legal Ethics Conference. If others would like to propose sessions and use the blog to locate potential collaborators, please send a blurb like this to wbw@cornell.edu] The idea that a lawyer owes...

Fourth International Legal Ethics Conference

Posted on August 12, 2009
(That's ILEC4, for those of you who are fond of acronyms.) The Stanford Center on the Legal Profession has put out a call for papers for the Fourth International Legal Ethics Conference, to be held July 15-17, 2010, in Palo...

Call for Papers

Posted on August 10, 2009
Vulnerable Populations and Economic Realities: An interdisciplinary approach to law teaching Golden Gate University School of Law and the Society of American Law Teachers?SALT?are presenting a two-day teaching conference in San Francisco on March 19/20, 2010...

Canadian Edition of Understanding Lawyers' Ethics

Posted on August 06, 2009
I?m very pleased that our LEF colleague Alice Woolley, will be writing a Canadian edition of Understanding Lawyers? Ethics. Alice and I met through the LEF, and Alice, Abbe Smith, and I will get together for the first time in...

Important Decision on Contempt

Posted on August 05, 2009
From BNA An attorney's sarcastic physical reaction to a disappointing bench ruling did not rise to the level of criminal contempt, the Georgia Court of Appeals said July 14 in vacating the lawyer's conviction (In re Hughes, Ga. Ct. App.,...

ABA Approves Housekeeping Amendments to Rule 1.10

Posted on August 03, 2009
George Kuhlman, the ethics counsel and associate director of the ABA's Center for Professional Responsibility, reports that the ABA approved important housekeeping amendments to Model Rule 1.10 this afternoon as part of the annual conference consent calendar...

New ABA Commission to Review the Model Rules

Posted on August 02, 2009
The ABA is about to undertake its first comprehensive review of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct since the Ethics 2000 Commission. The new effort, which is called the Ethics 20/20 Commission, will focus on issues related to globalization, including...

Offensive (But Constitutional) Lawyer Advertising?

Posted on July 31, 2009
Here is Law.com's description of a lawyer discipline case currently pending in New Jersey: New Jersey's Committee on Attorney Advertising held a hearing Monday to decide whether legal ethics rules were violated by the placing of a lawyer's advertising leaflet...

Criminal trial of criminal defense lawyer Robert Simels begins

Posted on July 28, 2009
Story here. And, btw, this makes me wonder when the Second Circuit will rule in the Lynne Stewart case. Any insights, out there? It's been 1.5 years, iirc, since the oral argument.

Comedian Shows Up in John Yoo's Class

Posted on July 27, 2009
Here is the resulting video. (Hat tip to the ABA Journal.) On a serious note, what do people make of this video? Did the comedian break any laws in making it? (I assume he trespassed.) Putting aside the legality of...

Should PR profs take the MPRE?

Posted on July 27, 2009
Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Ilya Somin's modest proposal is that lawyers who administer the bar exam actually take the bar exam, and that they be suspended from practice if they do not pass. How about this proposal: people who...

Plaintiffs' Summary Judgment Motion in Challenge to Louisiana's Proposed Advertising Rules

Posted on July 22, 2009
Public Citizen, which is leading a challenge to various provisions of Louisiana's proposed new Rules of Professional Conduct governing lawyer advertising (due to take effect October 1, 2009), has filed a second motion for summary judgment (here) in the Eastern...

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