Has your client ever suggested paying for your services via donations from a Kickstarter campaign, or a GoFundMe page? The District of Columbia Bar recently considered such donation-based crowdfunding, and greenlighted the basic concept — but noted that the ethical implications vary depending on the lawyer’s level of involvement in the crowdfunding effort.
Other people’s
If you’re admitted to handle a case PHV, mind your P’s and Q’s.
Translation: Pro hac vice admission to practice before a court outside the state where you’re licensed requires attention to a range of ethics duties, and running afoul of them can have bad consequences. Two recent cases spotlight some of the issues.
We’re
Everyone knows that we have an ethical duty of competence, and in most jurisdictions this includes a duty to be aware of the “benefits and risks” of relevant technology. Examples of possible technology issues affecting our practices: encryption (and cyber-security in general), cloud storage, e-mail handling, the internet of things — there
If you’re corporate counsel to an organization, you know how hard it can be to navigate privilege issues. In a single day, you can be involved in talking to business managers, communicating with your CEO and dealing with the board. When are your communications privileged, and how can you protect them? A recent Colorado district
Do we need another reminder about the perils of posting internet comments on cases and matters we are connected with? Apparently we do, and here’s a strong one. Earlier this month, an assistant U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana was disbarred based on hundreds of comments he posted pseudonymously on the website of
A federal district court refused last week to disqualify a Connecticut lawyer in a suit against Yale University, even though finding a violation of the state’s version of Model Rule 4.2, the “no contact rule.” Although ruling that disqualification was too extreme a sanction, the court ordered the turnover of interview notes from the
You probably know about the ethics rule that prohibits lawyers from trying to prospectively limit their liability to clients (or at least I hope you do!). You can find it in your state’s version of Model Rule 1.8(h).
In an interesting twist, the Utah Ethics Advisory Committee recently opined that it’s permissible to include
Advising a “client” on how to move “grey money” into the U.S. has resulted in an agreed public censure in September for a New York attorney. The lawyer (along with a number of others) was caught on video by Global Witness, a British-based public advocacy group. But the sanction raises some questions regarding the
Some answers are so obvious that you are left wondering why the question needed to be asked in the first place. Like “should a client pay a fee it agreed to in advance?” Or, “should an attorney try his or her best to prevail?”
And now this: the ABA’s Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional
Picture this: You’re travelling across U.S. borders, heading home from a client meeting abroad. However, unlike other trips, this time a Customs and Border Protection agent requests that you unlock and hand over for inspection your computer and cell phone — full of client confidential information. You’ve been concerned about this issue, and so you’ve