Law Commons^™

The Regulation Of Lawyers In Compliance, Jennifer M. Pacella

Washington Law Review

The field of compliance has exploded in interest, attention, and growth over recent years. It has emerged as a popular career path for those trained in the law, giving rise to an influx of job opportunities for new law school graduates and seasoned attorneys alike. Additionally, compliance has tightened the essential interplay between business and law. Numerous compliance officers hold J.D. degrees and many also serve simultaneously as both an organization’s chief compliance officer and general counsel, thereby muddying the lines between which service constitutes the “practice of law,” requiring adherence to professional rules of responsibility, or non-legal work, where …

Rules Versus Standards: A Moral Inquiry Into Washington's Character & Fitness Hearing Process, Jennifer Aronson

Washington Law Review

Historically, moral character inquiries within the state bar admission process have led to the exclusion of diverse and important voices from the legal profession, both consequentially and at times by design. Washington does not keep statistics on the race, ethnicity, gender, or economic class of bar applicants who are referred to character and fitness hearings, nor on the outcomes of those hearings. Examining how implicit bias and disparate outcomes interact in other areas of discretionary adjudicative decision-making illustrates the potential impact that the character and fitness process has on underrepresented communities in the legal profession.

In a criminal justice reform …

Thoughts On The Ethical Culture Of A Prosecutor's Office, Patrick J. Fitzgerald

Washington Law Review

I am truly honored to be asked to speak at this event, particularly an event held in honor of Norm Maleng. I want to talk about maintaining an ethical culture in a prosecutor’s office and give you a perspective on the things that have struck me after being an Assistant U.S. Attorney for about thirteen years—approaching seven years this fall as a U.S. Attorney, so about twenty years as a prosecutor. Some of the things I will say are obvious but worth repeating because we have to bear them in mind. Some are slightly subtle but worth pointing out. I …

Pennies From Heaven—Why Washington Legal Foundation V. Legal Foundation Of Washington Violates The U.S. Constitution, Kristi L. Darnell

Washington Law Review

In Washington Legal Foundation v. Legal Foundation of Washington, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that Washington's Interest on Lawyers' Trust Account (IOLTA) program did not perpetuate a "taking without just compensation" in violation of the Fifth Amendment. Even though the court acknowledged that IOLTA-generated interest was client property, the first element necessary to establish a taking, it reasoned that the appropriate subsequent analysis for this problem was the ad hoc test. Applying the ad hoc test to the IOLTA program, the court concluded that the requisite unconstitutional elements were absent. This Note argues that the Ninth Circuit …

Attorney-Client Confidentiality And The Assessment Of Claimants Who Allege Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Robert H. Aronson, Lonnie Rosenwald, Gerald M. Rosen

Washington Law Review

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was first recognized by the American Psychiatric Association in 1980. A PTSD diagnosis requires an individual or individual's loved ones to have experienced a traumatic event that was a threat to life or physical integrity and caused the individual to react to the incident with a specific number of avoidance, reexperiencing, and hyper-arousal symptoms. Obtaining a PTSD diagnosis can be of great value to a personal-injury plaintiff who claims damages due to a traumatic event. Further, if the traumatic event is unquestioned and the individual reports the classic symptoms, a PTSD diagnosis is relatively easy to …

Cries And Whispers: Environmental Hazards, Model Rule 1.6, And The Attorney's Conflicting Duties To Clients And Others, Irma S. Russell

Washington Law Review

This Article explores the attorney's duty of confidentiality in the context of environmental dangers, examining the history and purpose of the duty and the model ethical rule that controls issues of confidentiality, Rule 1.6 of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct ("Model Rules"). Important scholarship has criticized Model Rule 1.6, but that scholarship has not explored the effects of the Rule in the area where the stakes are highest: environmental catastrophes. The Article analyzes the Rule's text, commentary, and legislative history and discusses the two predominant views of the attorney in our society, the attorney as champion and as officer …

The Inadmissibility Of Professional Ethical Standards In Legal Malpractice Actions After Hizey V. Carpenter, Marc R. Greenough

Washington Law Review

In Hizey v. Carpenter, the Washington Supreme Court became the only court of last resort to prohibit introduction of the Code of Professional Responsibility and the Rules of Professional Conduct as evidence of an attorney's common law duty of care in an action for legal malpractice. This Note examines the Hizey decision and argues that the court should not create a preferential standard for attorneys. Instead, the court should admit professional ethical standards as evidence in legal malpractice actions on the same basis that the court admits statutes, ordinances, and administrative rules in other actions for negligence.

Towards Greater Openness In Judicial Conduct Commission Proceedings: Temporary Confidentiality As An Alternative To Inviolate Confidentiality—Garner V. Cherberg, 111 Wash. 2d 811, 765 P.2d 1284 (1988), Tom Montgomery

Washington Law Review

In Garner v. Cherberg, the Washington Supreme Court upheld certain rules of inviolate confidentiality adopted by the Washington Commission on Judicial Conduct. This Note examines the justifications for such confidentiality rules, and proposes temporary, rather than inviolate, confidentiality to better balance interests of fairness and the public's right to know.

Judicial Ethics: The Less-Often Asked Questions, Andrew L. Kaufman

Washington Law Review

Judicial ethics is a topic of increasing interest to the public, the bar, and the judiciary; only recently has the body of substantive law regarding judicial behavior begun to take shape. This essay explores the less developed issues of ex parte communication by judges, activities of judges' spouses, the obligation of judges to report attorney disciplinary violations, and extrajudicial comments by judges about legal matters. The Author analyzes the positions on these issues of the ABA Code of Judicial Conduct, the Judicial Conference of the United States' Code of Conduct for United States Judges, and the Discussion Draft of Draft …

Attorney Reinstatement Standards: A Proposal For Reform In Washington State, Anne Badgley

Washington Law Review

This Comment reviews the background leading to Washington's present reinstatement guidelines and analyzes the approach taken by the Washington Supreme Court in deciding reinstatement petitions. Three recent cases are discussed to illustrate the problems created by the current approach. This Comment suggests that the court adopt a new approach in deciding reinstatement cases. The proposed approach establishes uniform disbarment periods for specific offenses and clarifies the qualifications expected of individual reinstatement applicants. This approach utilizes the categories of offenses set forth in the proposal drafted by the American Bar Association (hereinafter ABA) Standards for Imposing Lawyer Sanctions. The proposed changes …

Loss Of Chance In Legal Malpractice, Polly A. Lord

Washington Law Review

The current procedure for proving causation in legal malpractice, known as the trial-within-a-trial method, has dissatisfied courts. One unexplored alternative is the loss of chance doctrine. Compensable chances lost in legal malpractice are capable of definition, and methods for valuing those chances are available. Procedural ramifications of proving legal loss of chance and policy justifications for the doctrine support the incorporation of loss of chance into some legal malpractice litigation.

Labor Law Preemption: The Ninth Circuit Grants Malpractice Immunity To Union Attorneys—Peterson V. Kennedy, 771 F.2d 1244 (9th Cir. 1985), Tim Adams

Washington Law Review

This Note traces the development of federal preemption in labor law, examining Peterson as an illustration of the tendency of courts to broadly interpret federal statutory labor policy. In particular, this Note questions whether preemption in a legal malpractice action is appropriate, since professional negligence is not expressly or impliedly addressed under federal statute, and is not an essential part of the national labor policy expressed in legislative history. This Note concludes that federal law should not have preempted the state cause of action in Peterson. Finally, this Note suggests that recognition of state legal malpractice actions would be an …

Lawyer Advertising, Tim J. Filer

Washington Law Review

This Survey Comment will give a brief synthesis of the constitutional law underlying the area of attorney advertising, and take a more detailed look at the Zauderer decision. While an overview of the Washington Rules has been given elsewhere in this issue, the primary focus of this comment will be on how the rules meet, and fall short of, the constitutional standards clarified in Zauderer. In particular, the prohibition of direct mail contact with specific persons known to need legal services in a specific matter appears to be unconstitutional. Additionally, the Washington rule limiting the use of trade names may …

Confidentiality Under The Washington Rules Of Professional Conduct, Stuart Watt

Washington Law Review

This Comment examines the lawyer's duty of confidentiality under the RPC. This examination begins with a discussion of the general rule of confidentiality and its purposes. The duty of confidentiality, however, is not absolute, and the RPC provide several exceptions to the rule. Under Rule 1.6, for example, a lawyer may disclose those client confidences necessary to carry out the representation of the client, to collect his or her fees, to defend the lawyer in an action regarding the representation of the client, or upon court order. In addition, under the RPC, the lawyer may reveal client confidences to the …

An Overview Of The Law Of Professional Responsibility: The Rules Of Professional Conduct Annotated And Analyzed, Robert H. Aronson

Washington Law Review

This Article contains two parts with different purposes. The first part consists of an introduction and critique of the recently adopted Washington Rules of Professional Conduct. Some of the rules that differ from the Model Rules, that violate Constitutional requirements, or that inappropriately resolve competing policies are evaluated. Two of the most important areas—confidentiality and advertising—are treated separately and in-depth in student Survey Comments. The second part of this Article consists of an overview of the law of professional responsibility in Washington. It follows the organization and rule sequence of the RPC, with annotations, applications, and interpretations from the ABA …

Legal Malpractice—Expansion Of The Standard Of Care: Duty To Refer—Horne V. Peckham, 97 Cal. App. 3d 404, 158 Cal. Rptr. 714 (1979), Karen J. Feyerherm

Washington Law Review

This note analyzes the Home court's reasoning in expanding the standard of care in legal malpractice actions to include a duty to refer and in holding attorneys to the same standard of care as physicians. This note also evaluates the considerations relevant to distinguishing "specialist" cases from "generalist" cases and the need for expert testimony in determining liability for failure to refer.

The Failure Of Situation-Oriented Professional Rules To Guide Conduct: Conflicting Responsibilities Of The Criminal Defense Attorney Whose Client Commits Or Intends To Commit Perjury, Joni Hammersla Ostergaard

Washington Law Review

The legal profession has long promulgated rules in an effort to guide attorneys toward appropriate ethical behavior. By formulating such rules and by enforcing them through professional discipline, the profession has undertaken the admirable task of policing its own members. The past decade has seen a proliferation of different standards for attorney conduct, in part because of common law developments in the areas of legal malpractice and ineffective assistance of counsel. In addition, the bar has contributed to the proliferation of conduct rules by establishing standing committees that have promulgated advisory ethical standards in certain specialized fields. Despite the increasing …

Professional Responsibility: Education And Enforcement, Robert H. Aronson

Washington Law Review

The failure of the Bar to regulate effectively the ethical conduct of its members is not solely the failure of law school teaching methodology. A much more serious deficiency-and one far more difficult to resolve—concerns the way lawyers perceive and attempt to enforce professional responsibility. Instead of providing an analytical framework which the individual lawyer can employ in considering problems arising in practice, the legal profession has chosen a series of ambiguous and only tangentially related rules which are often contradictory or misleading. Because these situation-oriented rules do not clearly encompass even a majority of the myriad factors potentially relevant …

Legal Ethics, James B. Kinne

Washington Law Review

Address by Judge James B. Kinne, to class in Legal Ethics, University of Washington Law School, December 4, 1937.