Categories
. Legal ethics

That’s not a Rule 8.4(c) violation. THAT’s a Rule 8.4(c) violation.

In February 2017, more than a dozen law professors filed an ethics complaint against Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to the President, alleging that she violated the attorney ethics rules applicable in D.C. through several false public statement she made — most notably, her repetitive statements about a terrorist incident that never actually occurred – the “Bowling […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

Can lawyers learn anything from the ending of the Academy Awards?

Well, of course, they can.  Or at least that is the conceit I’m going to stick to in order to write this post about a lawyer’s obligation to talk to their client about mistakes and make it seem topical and culturally relevant. By now, unless you live a very, very cloistered life you’ve at least […]

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. Legal ethics

Dear ABA – Embrace reform of the lawyer advertising rules. Please.

I have written in the past about the APRL white papers providing the rationale for, and data supporting the need to, reform the way lawyer advertising is regulated in the United States by state bar entities.  You can read those prior posts here and here if you are so inclined. Jayne Reardon, the Executive Director […]

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. Legal ethics

Learn something new every day. Or two things. Or three things. I’m not your boss.

About a week or so ago, I learned something new about South Carolina’s ethics rules – thanks to the law-student-powered blog of the University of Miami (FL) School of Law, Legal Ethics in Motion.  They wrote about a South Carolina federal court case in which a motion to disqualify premised on South Carolina Rule 1.18 was […]

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. Legal ethics

Friday follow up: DC Bar counsel’s weird priorities

So (finally) I’ve made myself read a bit more into the DC situation — that for many people is now ancient history but was news to me — about what seems like something that definitely got some play in the news but ought to be a more nationally discussed scandal.  The weird penchant that DC […]

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. Legal ethics

Bad ethics opinion or the worst ethics opinion? New York State Bar Ethics Opinion 1110 edition

Again, not fair actually.  This NY ethics opinion isn’t in the running for being the worst ethics opinion and isn’t even truly bad and actually, I guess, not even wrong.  But it does point out a really bad flaw with respect to the language of the particular NY rule it applies. What seems like an […]

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. Legal ethics

Arkansas and Wisconsin weigh in on client files in different ways and on different sides.

The need for clarity with respect to what makes up the “client file” has been an issue I have tried to stay up to date on dating back to our unsuccessful efforts back in 2009 to convince the Tennessee Supreme Court to adopt a rule – what would have been RPC 1.19 — to address […]

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. Legal ethics

Lying about everything is an awful way to go about life.

No, stop, this is not a post about politics.  Not sure why you’d think that just from the title… It’s Groundhog Day here in the United States.  As a person of a certain age, Groundhog Day makes me think of the Bill Murray movie more than the actual parlor trick with a rodent that happens […]

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. Legal ethics

About last night.

Things are moving so fast, the new administration has made it to one of the worst moments of the Nixon Administration in fewer than 11 days.  Now, in addition to being a constitutional crisis, America’s political drama involves an honest-to-goodness legal ethics issue so… To recap, yesterday Sally Yates, a career federal prosecutor who was […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

Harmonizing practice pending and pro hac vice provisions in Tennessee

The Tennessee Supreme Court issued an order last week implementing a helpful change to our rules on pro hac vice admission so that lawyers who are taking advantage of recent rule changes in Tennessee to permit practice pending admission can also be admitted pro hac vice in a lawsuit on behalf of a client.  You […]