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Academic

Legal Profession Blog

Cover legal ethics, bar discipline, business practice, the tension between the bar and the academy, ethical theory, and comparative legal professions.
By Alan Childress, Mike Frisch, and Jeff Lipshaw

Post Frequency: 40.8/day

Last Entry: April 01, 2011 at 14:56:26

A New Era In The District of Columbia

Posted on April 03, 2008
The long-awaited amendments to the rules governing bar disciplinary procedure in the District of Columbia have been issued by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. I will be posting comments after I have had the opportunity to review the...

Prosecutor Charged With Prejudicial Comments On Pending Case

Posted on April 03, 2008
The Attorney Grievance Commission of Michigan recently filed a disciplinary complaint that charges an elected county prosecutor with violating Rule 3.6 in making a series of published comments concerning a criminal matter shortly after a guilty verdict was returned...

California Changes

Posted on April 03, 2008
The web page of the California State Bar reports that amendments to the procedural rules governing bar discipline have been proposed by the Bar's Board of Governors. Among the proposed changes is a rule that prohibits last-minute resignations without any...

From Practice To The Bench

Posted on April 02, 2008
A recently installed judge had been a partner in a two-lawyer firm when appointed to the bench. He sought an ethics opinion on issues relating to his transition. The former partner has decided to discontinue the practice. As a result,...

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Like Caesar's Wife (Julius, Not Sid)

Posted on April 02, 2008
A defendant in a criminal case moved to disqualify the prosecutor on the ground that he had previously represented her in a case involving similar charges. The Missouri Supreme Court held that disqualification was appropriate. The court concluded that the...

Breach Of Ethical Obligations In Ex Parte Proceeding

Posted on April 02, 2008
The Kansas Supreme Court censured an attorney for misconduct relating to the administration of the estate of a "good friend." The attorney drafted the frirnd's will, which named himself and the client's brother as co-trustees of trusts created ubder the...

Google's Custom Time Gets New Rival

Posted on April 02, 2008
Posted by Alan Childress Yesterday, for obvious reasons, the law blog discourse.net posted on Gmail's new feature Custom Time that allows the user to set the time an email was apparently sent. Backdating is apparently good for late cancellations of...

Suspension For Sex With Incarcerated Client And False Denials

Posted on April 01, 2008
A Pennsylvania lawyer was suspended for 90 days for engaging in sexual activity with a client who was incarcerated at the Lehigh County Prison. The lawyer had developed a "close personal relationship" with the client, whom she had met when...

Capital Crime Conflict Held Waivable

Posted on April 01, 2008
The Utah Supreme Court concluded that a trial court had not abused its discretion in denying a motion to disqualify one of two attorneys defending a capital murder case. The lawyers "both members of the disappointingly small corps of attorneys...

Conversion With Mitigation Results In Suspension

Posted on April 01, 2008
The Georgia Supreme Court imposed a one-year suspension of an attorney who had converted over $44,000 of settlement proceeds in a workers' compensation case. The Special Master had found that the attorney suffered a mental breakdown and attempted suicide shortly...

DePaul Offers Great Symposium May 1 on the Ethics of the BUSINESS of Law

Posted on April 01, 2008
Posted by Alan Childress The DePaul Business and Commercial Law Journal, with the Commercial Law League of America (site is here), has announced its sixth annual symposium: Lawyers, Law Firms, & the Legal Profession: An Ethical View of the Business...

USNWR Reveals Washington Snafu - Top 100 to be Reduced to Top 95

Posted on April 01, 2008
According to a report just out, senior editors of US News and World Reports have scheduled a meeting next week with the deans from the law school at Washington University - St. Louis, the University of Washington, the Washington College...

Reinventing The Wheel

Posted on April 01, 2008
An attorney was convicted on his guilty plea to misdemeanor insurance fraud and suspended from practice for six months in New York as a result of the conviction. New York had held a hearing that explored the circumstances of the...

From Hollywood To Interim Suspension

Posted on March 31, 2008
The en banc Mississippi Supreme Court suspended Circuit Court Judge Bobby B. DeLaughter pending resolution of charges filed by the Commission on Judicial Performance based on two complaints alleging improper ex parte communications. The court states that "[n]o inference of...

Third Party Guarantee

Posted on March 31, 2008
A law firm entered into an agreement with a third party to guarantee payment of a client's legal bills. The firm agreed to release the client from further liability in exchange for a $5,000 payment. The firm then sued on...

No Reciprocal Suspension

Posted on March 31, 2008
In a reciprocal discipline matter from Ohio where the attorney had been suspended for failing to file a registration statement and complete CLE obligations, the New York Appellate Division for the Second Judicial Department declined to suspend and ordered a...

Federal Conviction, State Disbarment

Posted on March 31, 2008
The New York Appellate Division for the Second Judicial Department ordered disbarment of an attorney who had pleaded guilty to one court of possession of child pornography in the Southern District of New York. Automatic disbarment was deemed appropriate because...

More Than Spellcheck

Posted on March 31, 2008
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed a contempt finding made by a single justice that a suspended lawyer engaged in unauthorized practice by drafting a series of pleadings and related documents in a domestic case: "Kafkas argues on appeal, as...

A Pearl Of Wisdom

Posted on March 29, 2008
Not a legal profession case, but it is hard to resist commenting on a decision that opens with this eye-catching line: "No one wants to live near a hog confinement operation." The Iowa Supreme Court denied injunctive relief to the...

Comments About Judge Merit Sanction

Posted on March 29, 2008
An attorney who had previously served as an associate district court judge was suspended by the Iowa Supreme Court. He had left the bench after a conviction for an alcohol-related driving offense. This case involves discipline for a second offense...

Unauthorized And Ill-Informed

Posted on March 29, 2008
The Kansas Supreme Court indefinitely suspended an attorney who is presently serving a disciplinary suspension for assisting a friend in a bankruptcy, which the court concluded amounted to unauthorized practice of law as well as other violations. ".....

Why Small Moves in the USNWR Don't Mean Very Much

Posted on March 28, 2008
Posted by Jeff Lipshaw I opened up my RSS feed to Discourse.net and saw that it's "Black Friday" at the University of Miami Law School because it dropped twelve spots in the USNWR. As a public service, I am providing...

Genuine Issues Of Material Fact

Posted on March 28, 2008
A trial court order granted summary judgment to a defendant law firm in a legal malpractice case was reversed by the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. Foley & Lardner were sued by a former client who manufactures web guide control systems....

Not Unauthorized Practice

Posted on March 28, 2008
In a Nebraska probate proceeding, the county court ruled that two documents filed on behalf of a claimant by Tennessee counsel be struck as filings in violation of the Nebraska unauthorized practice statute. On appeal, the Nebraska Supreme Court reversed...

A Well Known Respondent

Posted on March 28, 2008
The Illinois ARDC has recently filed a disciplinary complaint charging the attorney with neglect and dishonesty toward his client. When pressed about the status of the case, the attorney allegedly told the client that "the wheels of justice grind slowly...

Feeding Employees Not Taxable

Posted on March 27, 2008
Not a Legal Profession case, but perhaps of interest to Paul Caron (if he has not already seen it) is a decision of the Nevada Supreme Court holding that giving complimentary meals to casino employees is not a taxable event:...

Florida Sets Standards For Presiding Over Capital Cases

Posted on March 27, 2008
A recent post on a judicial discipline case from New York referenced a dissent that lamented the lack of minimum qualification standards for judges. Florida has just adopted a rule setting forth standards for judges who preside over capital cases....

Another Cautionary Tale

Posted on March 27, 2008
The Oregon Supreme Court denied readmission of an attorney suspended in 1995 for non-payment of bar dues. The Bar contended that the case should be treated as a reinstatement after disbarment and the applicant did not contend otherwise. The attorney....

More Reciprocal Discipline

Posted on March 27, 2008
Two reciprocal discipline cases decided today by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals show the potentially complex issues of imposing discipline based on the findings of another jurisdiction. in the Hallal case, the court considered a matter where the...

Unauthorized Practice Results In Significant Sanction

Posted on March 27, 2008
A Pennsylvania attorney who had continued to practice after being transferred to inactive status was suspended for a year and a day by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. The court accepted a joint petition in support of discipline by consent...

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