Categories
Legal ethics

Rare but not unprecedented.

So, apologies all around. For those seeking out new content from me, I apologize for the brief hiatus. For those who hoped I’d stop at 500 posts, I apologize because for not stopping. For the first of what I hope will be at least another 500, let’s talk about a recent disbarment action that involves […]

Categories
Legal ethics

Things You Stone Kolb Can’t Do.

So, today’s post involves an ongoing (recently initiated in fact) disciplinary matter. Accordingly, the details available are based entirely on the one-sided positions set out in the disciplinary complaint. The ABA Journal has run a story about it, but once again, it first got on my radar screen because of discussion over at The Legal […]

Categories
Legal ethics

Some different COVID news.

It is safe to say, at this point, that most of the United States, and particularly southern states such as mine, are treating the pandemic as being over. Whether it actually is or is not remains to be seen. If it is over, its lasting effects will certainly live on. This post isn’t exactly about […]

Categories
Legal ethics

“In representing a client …”

I’ve written in this space in the past before about how there are many ethics rules that limit their application to lawyers such that they do not kick in unless a lawyer is representing a client. Perhaps, most prominently, this point has been dwelt upon when talking about the efforts to convince jurisdictions to enact […]

Categories
Legal ethics

Sorry to “ghost” on everybody

Life remains crazy for many, and the pandemic just doesn’t seem to have any intention of ending before it can have an extended Season 3 storyline. I almost hate to write these words and “jinx” it but my wife, my children, and I have continued to be able to avoid contracting Covid-19, but that doesn’t […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

Florida is a hopeless place.

No, I’m not going to have to get into talking about that it has a joke of a governor and has been actively trying to not make decisions in the best interest of public health during a crisis. I’m just going to focus on two developments in the legal ethics space that have occurred in […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

It is, very often, anti-social media.

You may recall that not too long ago I wrote a bit about a Tennessee Supreme Court opinion that I thought was a bit wrongly-framed from its opening sentence. It was the one that was really about why lawyers shouldn’t help people try to plan and cover up crimes but started: “This case is a […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

Bad judgment leads to bad judgment.

A Tennessee disciplinary matter has made some national news this past week, so what I am writing about might be something you’ve heard about already. It involves a Tennessee lawyer who has been given a 4-year suspension from practice, with one-year of active suspension for providing advice over Facebook to a woman about how she […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

Three short burst updates

In case you haven’t yet “checked out” for the week to have what I hope is a makeshift, stay-at-home Thanksgiving banquet to kick-off your holiday weekend, here are four very short but, mostly timely, updates on topics of prior posts. First, the Tennessee Supreme Court has put the TBA advertising rule revisions proposal out for […]

Categories
. Legal ethics

The era of permanent disbarment in TN has begun.

What now seems like an eternity ago, because it was written in the before-times, I wrote about Tennessee’s change to its disciplinary procedural rules resulting in implementation of permanent disbarment. I questioned exactly why the change was needed and what it would mean given that it was being paired with changes to extend the maximum […]