ABA releases new Formal Ethics Opinion on a lawyer's obligation to disclose information about a judge's disqualification

The ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility has issued ABA Formal Ethics Opinion 522 - Lawyer’s Obligation to Disclose Information About Grounds for a Judge’s Disqualification. Its abstract reads as follows: 

ABA Model Rule of Professional Conduct 8.4(d) prohibits a lawyer from engaging in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice. When a lawyer in a proceeding possesses information that the lawyer knows is reasonably likely to give rise to a judicial disqualification obligation, Rule 8.4(d) requires the lawyer, as an officer of the court, to disclose that information to the tribunal. When the lawyer possesses the information only because it is “information relating to the representation of a client,” then the lawyer’s disclosure obligation is subject to the lawyer’s duty of confidentiality under Model Rule of Professional Conduct 1.6.

For now (before it is archived), you can read the opinion here. 

Recently released documents in New York show communications among prosecutors in case of possible misconduct

NPR is reporting that "[n]ewly disclosed documents from inside the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan capture a sense of panic and dread among prosecutors and their supervisors as one of their cases collapsed last year amid allegations of government misconduct."  Go here for the full story.

Maine court expresses frustration with prosecution's cavalier attitude toward duties related to discovery and misunderstanding of duty of candor

This week, I will spend a few class hours discussing the duties of prosecutors and issues related to prosecutorial misconduct.

As I coincindence, over at the Legal Profession Blog, Mike Frisch is reporting about a recent case in Maine which illustrates some of the issues.

In this case, a defendant charged with driving on expired tags made a standard request for any dash cam video of the incident, but the prosecutor never responded nor sought to ascertain whether such video existed.

At trial, the prosecutor only used the officer involved in the case as a witness.  When the officer testified that there was in fact a dash cam video, the court became interested to know why the prosecutor had not bothered to produce it, and "[t]he court’s patience was obviously tried by the State’s continued  insistence that the video showing the alleged crime being committed had no  “evidentiary value.”"

In its order, the lower court rebuked the State for its approach to its discovery obligations and granted the defendant's motion to  suppress.

On appeal, among other things, the State argued that the court abused its discretion in selecting a sanction that effectively ended the  prosecution.  Yet the appeals court did not buy it. The court recognized that various obligations on prosecutors create challenges and that mistakes happen but affirmed that "[g]iven the substantial responsibility placed on the prosecutors to  provide timely discovery,... it is all the more important that the obligation be treated seriously. The court here expressed its frustration with  the State’s cavalier attitude toward discovery in several ways...  The court further noted the State’s persistent and inexplicable failure to recognize the relevance of the video."

Also, the court explained the prosecution's confusion about its duty of candor concluding that "[i]n arguing that the video was not “exculpatory,” and therefore not  discoverable, the State confuses its obligation pursuant to Rule 16(c) with its  obligation pursuant to Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963):

The due process  concepts articulated in Brady require the State to disclose to the defendant  evidence that is “favorable to the accused, either because it is exculpatory, or because it is impeaching . . . .” . . . Rule 16(c), in  contrast, requires the disclosure of items, including video recordings, that are  “material and relevant to the preparation of the defense.” . . .   

In conclusion,

What the State seems to miss in the matter before us, however, is  that there is a fine line between inadvertence and practices that the court  described here as “slipshod.” Carelessness in this critical area of constitutional  rights is not acceptable and is not an excuse. Moreover, the State’s continued  insistence that the defendant “suffered no harm” as a result of the State’s failure  to turn over the video of the crime makes it painfully evident that the State still  does not understand the nature of its obligations. 

          . . . .

The State’s continued insistence that the video of the defendant driving by the trooper was not material or relevant defies common sense and provides full support for the court’s determination that a serious sanction was warranted. The suppression of the evidence, while almost certainly fatal to the State’s prosecution, fell well within the discretion of the court. [and, according to the court, the lower court "plainly used the sanction to educate the State that its casual approach to fulfilling its discovery obligation was unacceptable.

The case us called State of Maine v Reed-Hansen, and you can read the opinion here.

The grades you don't want as a student and basic duties owed to clients, or the basic principles of ethical lawyering

Years ago, I wrote a short essay on whether we could reduce the professional conduct rules to just a few basic principles.  I concluded that, although we need the rules for guidance on specific issues, we can use a few general principles to define the notion of professional responsibility upon which all rules are generally based.

Along the same lines, a few weeks ago, Brian Faughnan posted a comment on “A recipe for ethical lawyering?” in which he expressed a similar idea by referring to the 5 Cs of lawyering:

Be COMPETENT at what you do
Recognize and respect your obligations of CONFIDENTIALITY
COMMUNICATE appropriately with your clients (and others) both as to content and frequency
Employ CANDOR in all situations in your practice [If you absolutely cannot be 100% truthful, and can’t simply stay silent, then don’t be false.]
Avoid CONFLICTS for which you don’t have, or cannot get, consent.

A few days later, Michael Kennedy followed up with his own commentary on the 5 Cs.

There is little to add to these two fine comments, but I will mention my own take on the 5 Cs, which is this: to try to get my students to remember the basic duties attorneys owe their clients, I tell them to think about the grades the do NOT want to get this semester: 1 F, 1 D and 4 Cs:

The F is for the Fiduciary duty owed to clients which in fact includes most, if not all, the others.

The D is for Diligence.

The Cs are for Competence, Confidentiality, Communication and Conflicts.

There are a couple of problems with my little word game for my students,* but it works for its purpose, I guess.... I hope...


*Note that “Conflicts” is, of course, not a duty – the duty is loyalty – but I needed a “C” to make the saying work!  Also note that I did not mention candor because, technically, the rule on candor says candor is owed to the tribunal, and my lesson was on duties owed to the client.  The equivalent of candor owed to the client would be Honesty, which I mention separately.  It is covered in the "catch-a;;" Rule 8.4 but can also be included in the notion of a fiduciary duty.

Short comment on Judge Kavanaugh and the Duty of Candor

Over at the Legal Ethics Forum, Prof. Milan Markovic (Texas A&M) has posted a short comment on whether Judge Kavanaugh i) had a duty to be candid in his nomination hearings and ii) he might have violated this duty.   You can read it here.

7th Circuit refuses to reverse a conviction even though the prosecutor did not comply with duty of candor to disclose perjured testimony

    Applying the principle that a federal court of appeals can not reverse a conviction unless the defendant shows that the lower state court’s decision was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established law under Supreme Court authority, the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently refused to reverse a conviction even though the prosecutor in the case failed to comply with the duty of candor. 

    In the case, Long v. Pfister, one of the key witnesses for the prosecution identified the defendant as the perpetrator of the crime in question even though the witness had at one point recanted her testimony.  When asked on cross–examination, the witness denied having recanted her testimony.  Both the prosecutor and defense counsel knew this was a lie.  Defense counsel eventually called another witness who testified that the prosecutor’s witness had lied on the stand.  However, the prosecutor did nothing to inform the court or the jury about the perjured testimony. The defendant was convicted.

    The defendant was denied post conviction relief by a federal district court, but a panel of the Court of Appeals reversed.  The panel concluded that, by not spontaneously correcting the perjured testimony, the prosecutor had violated the rule of Napue v. Illinois, 360 U.S. 264 (1959)  and Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972), which according to the panel’s interpretation, hold that whenever any witness makes a statement that the prosecutor knows is false, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires the prosecutor to correct that statement immediately.

    After an en banc rehearing, however, a majority of the court reversed.  According to the majority, the case involved four questions that have never been expressly decided by the Supreme Court: (1) Do Napue and its successors apply when the defense rather than the prosecutor elicits the false testimony?; (2) must the prosecutor correct false testimony when defense counsel already knows the truth?; (3) does the Constitution forbid a conviction obtained when the prosecutor does not correct but also does not rely on the falsehood?; and (4) does the Constitution forbid a conviction obtained when all material evidence is presented to the jury before it deliberates?

    In Napue v. Illinois the Supreme Court held that the State deprives a person of liberty without due process of law if it convicts the person by knowingly using false testimony.  Thus, Napue has been interpreted to hold that whenever any witness makes a statement that the prosecutor knows is untrue, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires the prosecutor to correct that statement. Rules of professional conduct in all jurisdictions also impose on all lawyers a duty to remedy the effects of material false evidence known to the lawyer before the end of the proceeding.  Further, in Giglio v. United States the Court reversed a conviction when a prosecutor failed to correct perjured testimony and then relied on it during summation to the jury. 

    The Court of Appeals, however, distinguished the case before it from these two cases.  In a 5 to 3 opinion, the court held that there is no clearly established Supreme Court law on whether a prosecutor has a duty to disclose perjury if the perjury is known to the defendant’s lawyer and the defendant’s lawyer presents evidence to contradict the perjured testimony. 

    In a strong dissenting opinion, however, three judges dispute the majority’s holding arguing that the opinion is based on notions that have been clearly rejected by the Supreme Court.  They, therefore, concluded that the defendant had met the burden to get Habeas Corpus relief. 

    According to the majority, it is not clearly established that a prosecutor has a duty to remedy known perjury if (1) the defendant’s lawyer already knew the testimony constituted perjury, (2) the defendant’s lawyer presented evidence to contradict it (which could create an inference in the jury that the testimony was not credible), and (3) the prosecution did not rely on the perjured testimony in its argument the jury. 

    The dissenting judges addressed all these arguments concluding that it is clear that a prosecutor has a duty to correct the testimony regardless of the circumstances.  A lie is a lie, and the prosecutor has a duty to correct it, they said.  The duty belongs to the prosecutor and he or she can’t rely on the evidence presented by the defendant to contradict the perjured testimony.  The fact that the defendant attempted to contradict the perjured testimony does not constitute a correction of the perjury.  

    It should be made clear that even though the case revolves around the issue of the duty of candor of a prosecutor, the court did not decide what that duty involves.  Unlike what has been reported in some news stories about the case (in the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin, for example), the court did not decide that a prosecutor does not have a duty to disclose perjury under the circumstances of the case.  It only held that the Supreme Court has not decided it.  It is precisely because, according to the court, the issue has not been decided, that it felt it could not reverse the conviction in this case.  I hope I am wrong, but I am afraid, however, that the case might be interpreted to relieve prosecutors of the duty of candor under certain circumstances.  That would be wrong.

    The Marshall Project has a comment on the case here.

Short comment on the different approaches to ghostwriting

A few years ago, the issue of whether it was proper for an attorney to "ghostwrite" documents for pro se litigants was hotly debated.  Some jurisdictions took the position that it was ok, other required lawyers to disclose their role.  See here and here for example. 

I had not see much on the issue since then until a few days ago, when I saw a short comment in Lawyerist summarizing the state of the law.  You can read it here.

Virginia clarifies duty of candor regarding possible perjury

The Legal Profession Blog is reporting that the Supreme Court of Virginia has approved amendments to Rules 1.6 and 3.3. The amendments clarify a lawyer’s obligations when a client discloses his or her intent to commit perjury in advance of trial, and whether the lawyer can withdraw from the representation before the client’s intended perjury occurs.  You can read the amendments here.

Illinois Appelate court on whether there is a duty to disclose death of client during settlement negotiations -- UPDATED, again

Back in February, 2015 I posted a story about an Illinois appellate court's opinion on whether an attorney has a duty to disclose the death of a client when the attorney is negotiating a settlement in litigation. The case is called Robison v. Orthotic & Prosthetic Lab, Inc and it is available here.  I later updated the story with the news that a disciplinary action had been filed against the attorney.  Today I am updating the story again to report that the Illinois Supreme Court has censured the lawyer. Go to the bottom of the post for the most recent update.


Original Story (February 2015)

About ten days ago, the Illinois appellate court issued a good opinion that deals with several issues we cover in class. The first one is whether an attorney has a duty to disclose the death of his client when the attorney is negotiating a settlement in litigation. The case is called Robison v. Orthotic & Prosthetic Lab, Inc and it is available here.

In this case, the plaintiff, Randy Robison, filed a product liability action against the defendant, Orthotic & Prosthetic Lab, Inc. in 2008.   In January, 2013, while the case was still ongoing, the plaintiff died but the plaintiff’s lawyers did not alert the court or the attorneys for the defendant.

In September 2013, the attorneys for both sides began settlement negotiations and reached an agreement on September 24. To finalize it, the attorney for the plaintiff sent an e-mail to the attorney for the defendant in which he stated “My client has instructed me to accept . . . in full and final settlement of this matter. Please provide an appropriate release and I will present it to my client for review and approval.”

The plaintiff's lawyer did not notify the defendant's lawyer of the plaintiff's death until after the defendant had submitted the settlement agreement, and he did so when he sent an amended version of the proposed release in which he asked the defendant's lawyer to agree to substituting the plaintiff's son as plaintiff in the case.  The defendant's lawyer refused and asked how come he had not been informed of the plaintiff's death, to which the plaintiff's lawyer replied that he had researched the issue and determined that he had no affirmative duty to disclose the information because it was against his clients' interests and he had a duty to protect his clients' interests within the bounds of the rules of professional responsibility.

The defendant refused to follow through on the settlement agreement claiming it was not valid, and the plaintiff moved to enforce the settlement.  Eventually, the lower court granted the motion and the defendant appealed.

In a short and well written opinion, the Court of Appeals reversed holding that the agreement was not valid and suggesting that the conduct of the attorney for the plaintiff in not disclosing the death of the client was unethical.  Interestingly, it also suggested that the conduct of the defendant's lawyer was unethical in not reporting the conduct of the plaintiff's lawyer.  Here are the most important paragraphs of the opinion:

... The defendant further argued that the settlement was invalid because the death of the plaintiff was a material fact that had been concealed from the defendant prior to and during settlement negotiations. ...

....

Settlement negotiations commenced in September 2013, and an agreement was ostensibly reached on September 24, 2013. The defendant, however, had no knowledge about the plaintiff's death or the appointment of a personal representative throughout the period of settlement negotiations. [These facts were not disclosed until] weeks after the settlement was reached and months after the plaintiff's death. [The plaintiff's lawyer acknowledged that] the disclosure of the plaintiff's death would have adversely impacted the settlement value of the case. He stated that he believed that the decision to withhold the information was in his clients' best interest and was in keeping with the rules of professional responsibility. We strongly disagree. We find that the arguments expressed by [the plaintiff's lawyer] are specious and incredible, and we are concerned about his professional judgment in this case. In failing to disclose the fact of the plaintiff's death, [the plaintiffs lawyer] intentionally concealed a material fact that would have reduced the overall value of the claim for damages. In addition, and equally troubling, [he] led the defendant to believe that he had authority to negotiate a settlement of the litigation on behalf of the party plaintiff, when the action was without a plaintiff as the plaintiff had died and a representative had not been substituted. Given [these] intentional misrepresentations and material omissions prior to and during the settlement negotiations, we conclude that the settlement agreement is invalid and unenforceable, and that the trial court erred in granting the motion to enforce it. 

In my opinion, this is the correct approach to the issue, but it needs to be explained a bit further.  Although it is well known that a lawyer does not have a general duty to volunteer adverse facts to an opponent in litigation,  Rule 4.1 has been interpreted to imply an exception which requires the disclosure of a client's death.  The most cited case holding this proposition is Virzi v. Grand Trunk, 571 F. Supp. 507 (E.D. Mich. 1983), which approaches the issue from the perspective of a duty to the court because in that case the attorney did not disclose the death of the client until after the court had entered an order. However, the court does go on to say that just as the lawyer owes a duty to the court, he or she also owes the same duty to opposing counsel.  Based on this view, at least two courts (one in Ohio and one in Kentucky) have imposed sanctions on attorneys for failing to disclose their client's death. In Robison, the court did not discuss rule 4.1 but emphasized the attorney's general duty of honesty under rule 8.4, which is presumably owed to everyone.

Interestingly, the court did not stop there and also took up the fact that counsel for the defendant did not report the misconduct under rule 8.3:

Finally, we believe that we have a profound responsibility to comment on the conduct of the attorneys in this case.  ... Rule 8.4(c) of the RPC states that it is professional misconduct for a lawyer to engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation. ...   Rule 8.3 requires a lawyer to report unprivileged knowledge of misconduct involving fraud, dishonesty, or deceit, or misrepresentation by another lawyer to the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (ARDC). ...

In this case, we believe that the material omissions and misrepresentations ... constitute serious violations of Rule 8.4. We also believe that defense counsel possessed sufficient knowledge to trigger a duty to report [the plaintiff's lawyer's] misconduct to the ARDC, and that the failure to report the misconduct constitutes a potential violation of Rule 8.3.

UPDATE 10/26/15:  About ten days ago, a formal disciplinary complaint was filed against the lawyer who did not report the death of the client.  You can read the complaint here.  (Thanks to the Legal Profession blog for the update.)  It remains to be seen if there will be a complaint against the lawyer who did not report the misconduct.  Given the language in the opinion, it seems to me it would be inconsistent, to say the least, if the administrator did not do so.

UPDATE 12/14/15:  The attorney has now filed an answer to the disciplinary complaint (available here) in which he argues that he researched the issue and discussed the matter with his partners and concluded that the death of his client was confidential information which he had a duty not to disclose under Rule 1.6(a). 

UPDATE 5/27/16:   The Illinois Supreme Court has imposed a censure on the lawyer for settling the case without informing court or opposing counsel of the client’s death.  The case is In the Matter of: Anthony Patrick Gilbreth, No. 6289576, Commission No. 2015PR00100 (Ill. SC May 18, 2016).   Lawyer Ethics Alert Blog has more information here.

Can lawyers lie during negotiations?

Can a lawyer lie during negotiations? 

The Comment to Model Rule 4.1 (Truthfulness in statements to others) states that the duty not to make false statements of material facts refers only to "statements of fact" and that under "generally accepted conventions in negotiation, certain types of statements ordinarily are not taken as statements of material fact."  But what does that really mean?

To help us understand, Professor Ron Rotunda has published a short review of the issues here.

Another opinion on the duty to disclose client's death

Last month I posted a comment on a recent Illinois case on whether an attorney has a duty to disclose the death of his client when the attorney is negotiating a settlement in litigation.

About ten days ago, the Legal Profession blog reported on another opinion on the same subject.  In this one, an attorney who had failed to disclose his client's death prior to settling an employment claim was suspended for one year.  The case is called Matter of Rosner and it is available here.

Former prosecutor sues DA's office claiming he was fired for refusing to act unethically

A man who worked for several years as a prosecutor in Corpus Christi, Texas is suing the District Attorney's office arguing that he was fired because he refused to act unethically. 

According to this story aired in Action News 10 and published here, the prosecutor says he lost his job for following his duty under the law.  According to the complaint (as explained in the story), when the prosecutor uncovered a witness who had the potential to help someone he was prosecuting, his bosses told him not to share the information with the other side.  Instead, the prosecutor called the State Bar of Texas for an opinion which confirmed he had a duty to disclose the information.  Following his duty, however, the prosecutor told his supervisors he was going to disclose the witness and was fired the morning of the trial.

NY Times and ABA Journal on the interview with Robert McCulloch

Yesterday, I commented on the recent interview with Bob McCulloch, the St. Louis County prosecutor who handled the Grand Jury proceeding against Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, in which he seems to admit to having used perjured testimony.  Today, the New York Times and the ABA Journal picked up the story (here and here).  Both mentioned the fact that McCulloch admitted to allowing a certain witness to testify even though he "was sure" she was not telling the truth.

Again, if the prosecutor was "sure" the witness was not telling the truth, then why is allowing her to testify not a violation of the duty not to present false evidence?   Is saying that he was sure she was lying the same as saying he "knew" she was lying?  Or, is saying that he was sure simply saying that he strongly suspected that the witness was lying, but did not actually know it?

If it is the former, he admitted to violating the rules.  If it is the latter, he did not. 

Did the St. Louis County prosecutor admit to a violation of the rule regarding perjury?

Below you will find a video of a radio interview with Bob McCulloch, the St. Louis County prosecutor who handled the Grand Jury proceeding against Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri.  The interview is interesting for many reasons, but the part that really caught my attention was the discussion about the possibility that some of the witnesses committed perjury.

This discussion starts at the 9 minute mark of the recording.  The interviewer asks "Why did you allow people to testify in front of the grand jury in which you knew their information was either flat-out wrong, or flat-out lying, or just weren't telling the truth?" In response, McColluch is vague as to whether he agrees with the premise of the question (that he knew some of the witnesses were not telling the truth), but later he specifically says it was clear some of the witnesses were not telling the truth and, further, admits that he would not normally use witnesses like those - that he did that specifically for this one case. Later he adds that he was "absolutely sure" that some witnesses lied under oath, but that he would not seek perjury charges (at minute 16:15 or so).

Was that an admission that he knowingly presented false evidence/perjured testimony?

Are the rules related to grand juries so different that they allow the knowing use of false evidence in an effort to have the jury assess credibility?  That is how McCulloch tries to explain his conduct. He states that "I knew that no matter how I handled it, there would be criticism of it. So if I didn't put those witnesses on, then we'd be discussing now why I didn't put those witnesses on. Even though their statements were not accurate. So my determination was to put everybody on and let the grand jurors assess their credibility, which they did. ...I wanted to put everything on there. I thought it was much more important to present everything and everybody, and some that, yes, clearly were not telling the truth. No question about it."

If the prosecutor was so concerned with how "we'd be discussing now why I didn't put those witnesses on," let try this on for size: How about stating "because I have an ethical obligation not to put those witnesses on the stand.  Those witness are lying and the system can't function if we allow prosecutors to knowingly use false evidence."  That wouldn't be so difficult, would it?

I understand the prosecutor's decision to allow the witnesses to testify if he merely believed, but did not know, that they were lying. That essentially means he thought they had poor credibility and that it would be better to let the jury assess that credibility.  Allowing witnesses to testify when you have doubts as to whether they are telling the truth (as long as there is no knowledge) is not a violation of the rules.  But the prosecutor here used different language. He essentially said he knew they were lying. Once you have knowledge, the rule is clear.

Maybe the prosecutor meant the former but said the latter.  Otherwise, I think he admitted to using false evidence. I should clarify that this is not an admission of suborning perjury because suborning suggests he encouraged the witness to lie. Here what he seems to admit to is allowing someone to testify falsely when he knew they were lying. That is not suborning perjury but it is knowingly using false evidence which is a violation of Rule 3.3.

In the end, the question is whether the comments should be interpreted to mean he knowingly violated the rules or that he merely had doubts as to the credibility of the witnesses and allowed the jury to decide, which would not be a violation of the rules.  

Here is the video:

Reversal of conviction because prosecutor used perjured testimony

The Indiana Court of Appeals had reversed a burglary conviction based on its conclusion that the prosecution knowingly used perjured testimony.  For more details go to the Legal Profession blog.

Discipline for failing to correct client's affidavit when attorney finds out the client lied

The Legal Profession blog is reporting on a recent report and recommendation by the Illinois Review Board.  In a nutshell, the recommendation for sanctions is based on the fact that the attorney failed to take remedial measures once the attorney found out a client lied.  The client told the attorney he was a sole heir and based on that information the attorney filed an affidavit and some documents asking the client to be appointed as administrator of the estate.  At some point, however, the attorney realized the client had lied and that he was not the only heir.  The attorney, however, failed to correct the affidavit or to take other remedial measures regarding the client's perjury.

The notion of discipline for failing to take remedial measures regarding perjury is not surprising and I don't have a problem with the recommendation.  I wonder, however, if the Board cited the wrong rule in support of its decision.  It seems to base its recommendation on an alleged violation of Rule 3.3(a)(1) which imposes a duty to take remedial measures when an attorney comes to know the falsity of a fact the lawyer asserted.  In this case, the fact was asserted by the client.  

Read the full story here and here.

Thoughts on discovery practice

In class we spend a lot of time discussing ethical issues related to the practice of discovery.  A few days ago, Max Kennerly, of the Litigation and Trial blog posted some of his thoughts on issues related to discovery and to the discussions over motions to compel that take place after one of the parties fails to comply with their duty under discovery rules.  You can find the post here.  It is short  and worth reading.

Article on the need for a duty of candor to clients

Here is a short article arguing that the Model Rules should have a rule directly requiring honesty to clients.

Thanks to the Legal Ethics Blog for the link

What to do when a witness lies

Every law school professional responsibility textbook has a section on what to do when a client lies.  We all cover that material, but when we do, we usually use cases that involve the duties of a criminal defense lawyer.  Which is why I think this recent post is a must read for everyone interested in the topic.  The author is a prosecutor in New York and his blog is very good. 

New article and debate about the problem of the client who intends to commit perjury

Over at the the Legal Ethics Forum, an article by Richard Zitrin has ignited the never ending debate as to what to do when a criminal defendant client wants to commit perjury.  It is well worth taking a look at here and here.