Law Commons^™

Legal Ethics, Roy M. Sobelson

Mercer Law Review

This Article covers the rules, cases, ethics opinions, and other matters decided by the Georgia Supreme Court, the Georgia Court of Appeals, and a federal district court between June 1, 1998, and May 31, 1999, that have most affected, or may affect, Georgia lawyers. Many eyepopping headlines about lawyers and their profession filled the survey period. Although very few of the underlying cases made or changed any substantive law, they may well have substantially altered the landscape of lawyering, creating or illuminating various pitfalls and land mines.

One Georgia lawyer, disbarred for murdering his landlord, avoided the death penalty only …

A Panel Discussion On A Proposed Code Of Ethics For Legal Commentators

Mercer Law Review

Featuring:

• Raymond M. Brown
• Paul Butler
• Erwin Chemerinsky
• Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr.
• Laurie L. Levenson
• John H. McElhaney
• Barry C. Scheck
• Mary Tillotson

Moderator: Professor James P. Fleissner

A Ransom Note From The Opposition To The Proposed Rules Of Ethics For Legal Commentators, Raymond M. Brown

Mercer Law Review

Hijack the question!

That is a soupçon of tactical knowledge that every lawyer sojourning on the TV frontier absorbs quickly. In the fast-paced realm of the electronic media, there are limited opportunities to speak. To be effective you must disregard the dictates of politeness ingested at your mother's knee, ignore the question presented, and make your point succinctly. To wit:

Question: Do you think Bill Clinton should be impeached?

Answer: I think the abuse of power by Ken Starr doomed the Office of Independent Counsel and set a dangerous example for a whole generation of prosecutors.

Because the proponents of …

Symposium Introduction, Jennifer L. Motos, Jacob E. Daly

Mercer Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Ethics Of Being A Commentator Iii, Erwin Chemerinsky, Laurie Levenson

Mercer Law Review

The use of lawyers and law professors as commentators continues to increase. Although reporters have long used experts to explain and evaluate, in the last decade legal commentators have become a fixture in news stories about legal proceedings. A decade ago, when the McMartin Preschool case filled the news in Los Angeles, scarcely a commentator was used. A few years later, when the officers who beat Rodney King were tried in state court, daily legal commentary was absent. In sharp contrast, commentators were used on a regular basis during the federal prosecution of those officers. The subsequent trial of two …