Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility Commons^™

Breaking Past The Parallax: Finding The True Place Of Lawyers In Securities Fraud, Marianne C. Adams

Fordham Urban Law Journal

Lawyers often play an integral part in business transactions and securities offerings. This puts lawyers on the sidelines of not only great business successes, but also, every so often, tremendous failures. Because they are viewed by many as gatekeepers, and in that role provide a degree of assurance (with their reputational capital) that gross illegalities will not occur, a series of questions arise in the minds of many when illegalities do happen on attorneys’ watch. This Note analyzes the legal standards that are in play and those that should be imposed when lawyers aid or abet a fraud. Part I …