New decisions on unauthorized practice of law

The Supreme Court of Ohio ruled today that Cincinnati-based Foreclosure Solutions L.L.C. and the company’s owner, Timothy A. Buckley engaged in the unauthorized practice of law by giving legal advice and negotiating with lenders on behalf of thousands of property owners facing foreclosure of their mortgages. For the full story go here.

Last week, the Illinois Court of Appeals (4th division) decided a case called People v Harris, in which it affirmed a conviction of a law school graduate for "false personation of an attorney." He admitted that he was not admitted to practice in Illinois.

The applicable statute reads as follows: “A person who falsely represents himself or herself to be an attorney authorized to practice law for purposes of compensation or consideration commits a Class 4 felony. This subsection (a) does not apply to a person who unintentionally fails to pay attorney registration fees established by Supreme Court Rule.”

The defendant argued that because the statute does not specify that he must be authorized to practice law in Illinois, he did not violate the law if he was licensed in any one state or jurisdiction. I would have thought this argument to be absurd; why would you have an illegal practice of law statute if it wasn't to penalize people who are not authorized to practice law in the state? Yet, by comparing the statute that was repealed when this one was enacted, the court concluded that the defendant was correct. It concluded that "[t]he current statute indicates the legislature’s intent to exclude authorized attorneys from other jurisdictions from the statute’s reach."

This interpretation strikes me as very odd. It means that an attorney not admitted to practice law in Illinois who was practicing law in Illinois would not be in violation of the statute as long as he was admitted to practice somewhere else. In other words, if an attorney admitted in any other state but not in Illinois came to Illinois and ran an office in Illinois to provide legal services to Illinois clients, the state could not argue that he was practicing law illegally in Illinois.

Isn't that the "definition" of practicing law illegally in a jurisdiction? Am I missing something here?

After giving the defendant this small victory, however, the court went on to affirm the conviction finding that there was no credible evidence to suggest that he was in fact admitted anywhere else and there was clear evidence that he was not admitted in two of the four jurisdictions he claimed he had been admitted to.

The court also rejected the defendant's argument that the statute does not apply to law school graduates with legal experience. He argued that law school graduates have legal training and thus are not falsely representing themselves as attorneys.

Now, this one is absurd! He actually argued that a law graduate would not be guilty of practicing law illegally because he was a law graduate. I guess he missed that little detail about having to pass the bar exam to be allowed to practice law... The court rejected the argument.

The opinion is available here.