Categories : Legal Ethics1 Comment
What to Do When Your Client Wants to Sue for Malicious Prosecution
Consider these factors before taking on your client's case.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Don’t Gloss Over the Environmental Site Assessment!
Attorneys should always ensure their purchaser client satisfies the CERCLA innocent landowner defenses, including a careful analysis of the Phase I ESA.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Criminal Defense Flat Fees: Navigating the New Rules of Professional Conduct
The new California Rules of Professional Conduct necessitate changes from the customary business arrangement by criminal defense attorneys with their clients.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Close Can Be Complicated
Edward McIntyre's MacBeth advises on California's new conflict rule, Rule 1.7.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Criminal Defense: The Private Practice View
As I reflect upon almost a decade of private practice, having had the privilege of working with some of the best criminal defense lawyers, prosecutors and judges in Southern California, there are a few perspectives that I have developed that may be unique to the private sector.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Under California´s New Ethics Rules, Are Lawyers Ever Off The Clock?
Until November 1, 2018, California was the lone hold out state that had not yet adopted some version of the ABA Model Rules. And while we had our own statutes that addressed attorney misbehavior on personal time, we did not formally have our own version of the ABA Misconduct rule.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Criminal Defense Flat Fees: Navigating the New Rules of Professional Conduct
Michael L. Crowley discusses the new California Rules of Professional Conduct and the subsequent impact on the customary business arrangement between criminal defense attorneys and their clients.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Responsible Communication with Clients
Competency in technology is not optional; it is ethically required.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Responsible Communication with Clients
Rule of Professional Conduct 1.4 imposes a duty on lawyers to communicate with their clients. Whether the attorneys choose to do so through emailing, texting, telephoning, or drafting letters, each of those options is likely available through the phone that often resides in the lawyer’s purse or pocket.
Categories : Legal Ethics
Settlement Demands, Extortion and the Litigation Privilege
By Carole J. Buckner
In People v. Toledano, 2019 WL 2577211 (June 24, 2019), the court addressed an important question of first impression, holding that the litigation privilege, California Civil Code Section 47, may apply as a defense to a criminal prosecution for extortion based on a settlement demand, where the demand is made in a good faith belief in a legally viable claim, and in serious contemplation of litigation, and the statements made are sufficiently connected to the litigation. The court in Toledano found that the lower court’s refusal to so instruct the jury was prejudicial error, requiring a reversal of the conviction against the attorney for extortion.