Professional Responsibility Blog

About two weeks ago, the Illinois Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a very interesting case that started last year when a trial judge ap...

Last week I reported that the New York City Bar Association  issued an ethics opinion holding that lawyers must take reasonable precautions...

How we define "the practice of law" has been a difficult question for a long time.  At one point, the ABA created a task force to ...

Given a number of recent reports that people's phones are being "searched" by customs officials when entering the US or other ...

It has been a while since I have posted an entry into the " How not to practice law " series, a series of posts about incredibly s...

Back in April, the Los Angeles County Bar Association issued an ethics opinion on whether a lawyer hired by an insurance company to represen...

A few days ago, I reported that the NY state bar association issued an opinion holding it would be unethical to participate in Avvo Legal Se...

The New York State Bar Association’s Committee on Professional Ethics has issued a new opinion holding that participating in Avvo Legal Serv...

The Florida bar is likely to adopt an ethics opinion that would make it easier for Florida lawyers to enter into co-...

Last month I reported ( here ) that three committees of the New Jersey Supreme Court issued a joint opinion concluding that it would be unet...

The Advisory Committee on Professional Ethics, the Committee on Attorney Advertising, and the Committee on the Unauthorized Practice of Law ...

The Standing Committee on Professional Responsibility of the State Bar of California recently issued an advisory opinion on whether “bloggin...

Back in January I wrote a long post on a proposal to amend Model Rule 8.4 to make it a sanctionable offense to engage in harassment or di...

Back in May I reported that the Virginia Supreme Court announced it was going to adopt new lawyer advertising rules.  See here .  The new ru...

As I am sure you know by now, the ABA recently approved an amendment to Model Rule 8.4 to make it misconduct to use discriminatory or biased...

I have often complained that judges don't do enough to discourage misconduct by lawyers during discovery in civil trials, which I think ...

The ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility recently issued Formal Ethics Opinion 477, which updates Formal Ethics ...

The Florida Supreme Court has adopted new rules addressing collaborative family law practice.  You can read the details here .

Long time readers of this blog know that I have been following and writing about the debates related to Avvo Legal Services for some time no...

Back in 2015, the Florida Supreme Court rejected amendments to state regulations on referral services and directed the State Bar to instead ...

NPR has published an interesting short article chronicling a criminal case recently dismissed because of prosecutorial misconduct.  The tit...

The Georgia Supreme Court recently absolved a state prosecutor of ethics charges arising from an alleged violation of the duty to disclose ...

The Virginia Supreme Court has announced that it will adopt new lawyer advertising rules effective July 1, 2017.  Here is the announcement ...

The Law for Lawyers Today blog is reporting on a recent case applying the "hot potato doctrine" in Mississippi.  You can read the ...

My article Justice Gap vs. Core Values: The Common Themes in the Innovation Debate was recently published by the Journal of the Legal Profes...

Earlier today, the Illinois Supreme Court amended the Illinois rule that imposes a minimum number of hours of CLE dedicated to Professional...

Over at Above the Law , David A. Lash, the Managing Counsel for Pro Bono and Public Interest Services at O’Melveny & Myers LLP, has publ...

In an important and highly anticipated opinion, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has rejected an argument against the rules of pr...

A few days ago I posted a note about a recent case on the issue of whether a fee sharing contract that does not strictly meet all the requir...

A few years ago I reported on an Illinois case that held that a contract that violated the rules of professional conduct could not be enforc...

Feb. 24, 2017   The ABA Standing Committee on Ethics & Professional Responsibility is currently accepting comments on APRL’s comprehens...

Last week, the Supreme Court of Tennessee issued an order adopting a number of amendments to the state's rules of professional conduct, ...

The Ohio Board of Professional Conduct recently issued an advisory opinion on lawyer advertising that emphasizes the need to be clear about ...

Legal Ethics in Motion is reporting that the California Standing Committee on Professional Responsibility and Conduct has finalized an op...

The New York State Bar Association, and Legal.io, a developer of referral-network and marketplace platforms for the legal industry, have tea...

Earlier this month a federal magistrate judge in Virginia held that placing privileged materials on an unprotected file-sharing site waived ...

If you saw the original story, scroll down to the end for an update: I am sure you have heard by now that fifteen professors of legal eth...

As reported in Legal Ethics in Motion , a recent opinion of a Texas bar panel concludes that there is no duty to inform opposing counsel tha...

Back in October, the Illinois State Bar Association (ISBA) issued a Professional Conduct Advisory Opinion stating that a lawyer may use clou...

October 1, 2016.   Last week the Supreme Court of Florida became the 25th state to adopt the duty of technological competence that the ABA ...

Law Sites has a story and a critique of a recently launched company helps consumers find lawyers based on their win rates.  The ABA Journal...

Here is a new short article on ethical considerations when switching from criminal defense to the prosecution published by the New York Leg...

Last week I discussed the comment to Model Rule 1.1 which makes it an element of the duty of competence to understand, and stay current on, ...

Just a few days ago, the ABA House of Delegates adopted a new Model  Rule  for  Minimum Continuing Legal Education (MCLE).  You can find the...

Just about a year ago I reported ( here ) that the two most recent decisions on whether a convicted criminal defendant had to prove actual...

Yesterday, the Illinois Supreme Court announced rule amendments that make Illinois the first state to adopt so-called “proactive management ...

Readers of the blog might be interested in this forthcoming law review article: Restraining Lawyers: From 'Cases' to 'Tasks'...

The ABA Center for Innovation, about which I wrote not too long ago here , is accepting applications for its inaugural fellowship program. ...

Just a few minutes ago I posted an item on the much discussed newly adopted ABA Model Rule 8.4(g), and then I found this new bit of news:  ...

The ABA recently approved an amendment to Model Rule 8.4 to make it misconduct to use discriminatory or biased speech.  Back in January I ...

For those of you interested in issues related to the criminal justice system, you may want to check out a new article by David Patton (NYU L...