Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility Commons^™

When Mental Health Meets “The One-Armed Man” Defense: How Courts Should Deal With Mccoy Defendants, Farid Seyyedi

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

The Supreme Court’s opinion in McCoy v. Louisiana held that a defendant has a constitutional right to insist their attorney not concede guilt as to any element of an offense, even if doing so is the only reasonable trial strategy to give the defendant a chance at life imprisonment instead of the death penalty. Under McCoy’s holding, a defendant can insist on maintaining their innocence—even in the face of overwhelming evidence—and force their attorney to pursue a defense that will land them on death row. The Supreme Court’s holding makes clear that a strategic concession of guilt at trial—over …

Ethics In An Echo Chamber: Legal Ethics & The Peremptory Challenge, Kayley A. Viteo

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

Abstract forthcoming.

Where's Rudy?, James E. Moliterno

Scholarly Articles

Choice of law in lawyer discipline matters, and the language among the popular choice of law rules in use matters. The core goals of choice of law principles should not limit the choices to the states in which a lawyer has a full, formal license. Doing so undermines the modern choice of law interests analysis by eliminating jurisdictions that may have the greatest interest in the conduct.

Lawyers cross borders physically and electronically on a daily basis. Accordingly, choice of law rules are critical, especially when a lawyer engages in missions that are targeted at particular jurisdictions, as Rudy Giuliani …

Inside-Out: Bringing Law Students Face-To-Face With Injustice, Romie Griesmer

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

Lawyer Speech, Investigative Deception, And The First Amendment, Rebecca Aviel, Alan K. Chen, False

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

It seems unassailable that attorneys must refrain from deception or dishonesty of any kind as a condition of professional licensure. But this principle, one of the foundational norms of the legal profession, may well infringe upon First Amendment rights, at least in certain applications. In this Article, we confront the tension between an attorney’s expressive and associational rights and her professional duty of absolute honesty. We explain that the latter must yield to the former in the unique circumstances presented by undercover investigations, where attorneys work side-by-side with journalists, civil rights testers, political activists, and others who seek to expose …

Remembering Professor Rhonda Gay Hartman, Ken Gormley

Duquesne Law Review

Professor Rhonda Gay Hartman, who passed away unexpectedly in April of 2021 as this issue of the Duquesne Law Review was being finalized, was an elegant, forward-thinking, brilliant scholar and teacher. She left a lasting imprint on legal academia, on the Duquesne community, and on the thousands of students whom she taught and mentored for over twenty-five years.

Frivolous Defenses, Thomas D. Russell

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This article is about civil procedure, torts, insurance, litigation, and professional ethics. This is an empirical piece with data drawn from a sample of 356 answers to 298 complaints in car crash lawsuits to identify various ways that, I argue, insurance defense lawyers evade the rules of civil procedure and, frankly, act unprofessionally.

The empirical center of this piece examines 356 answers in car crash personal injury cases in Colorado’s district courts. First, I situate these cases within dispute pyramid elements including the total number of miles-traveled within Colorado and also with respect to the volume of civil litigation.

The …

Allocating Medicine Fairly In An Unfair Pandemic, Govind Persad

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

America’s COVID-19 pandemic has both devastated and disparately harmed minority communities. How can the allocation of scarce treatments for COVID-19 and similar public health threats fairly and legally respond to these racial disparities? Some have proposed that members of racial groups who have been especially hard-hit by the pandemic should receive priority for scarce treatments. Others have worried that this prioritization misidentifies racial disparities as reflecting biological differences rather than structural racism, or that it will generate mistrust among groups who have previously been harmed by medical research. Still others complain that such prioritization would be fundamentally unjust. I argue …

Ordinary Clients, Overreaching Lawyers, And The Failure To Implement Adequate Client Protection Measures, Leslie C. Levin

American University Law Review

Every year, thousands of individual clients are victimized by overreaching lawyers who overcharge clients, refuse to return unearned fees, or steal their money. For more than forty years, the American Bar Association (ABA) has considered, and often proposed, client protection measures aimed at protecting clients from overreaching lawyers. These measures include requirements that lawyers use written fee agreements in their dealings with clients and rules relating to fee arbitration, client protection funds, insurance payee notification, and random audits of trust accounts. This Article examines what happened to these ABA recommendations when the states considered them and assesses the current state …

Revising The Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure: Carving Out A More Active Role For Congress, Michael Vitiello

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Dangerous To Be Right When Established Authorities Are Wrong: A Proposal For The Protection Of America’S Migratory Birds, Dylan-Forrest F. Greene

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Specialty Bar Associations And The Marketing Of Ethics: The Example Of The Academy Of Adoption Attorneys, Malinda L. Seymore

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Looking Beyond The Profit And Into The Light: Consumer Financial Protections And The Common Good, Veryl V. Miles

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Symposium Spring 2021: The Ethics Of Government Service

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Anatomy Of Government Ethics Reform: Lessons Learned, A Path Forward, Paula A. Franzese

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Unweaving Hubbard’S Web: A Review Of Alabama’S Ethics Laws, Ferris Stephens, Andrew R. D'Entremont

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Who Should Police Politicization Of The Doj?, Bruce A. Greene, Rebecca Roiphe

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Justice Department And The Rule Of Law, Jonathan Kravis, Jessie K. Liu

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Appeal Waivers: When Must They Be Raised?, Nicole A. Paige

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Strained Relationship Between Hair Discrimination And Title Vii Litigation And Why It Is Time To Use A Different Solution, Christine Kennedy

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Bringing Corporate Governance Down To Earth: From Culmination Outcomes To Comprehensive Outcomes In Shareholder And Stakeholder Capitalism, Malcolm Rogge

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Praxis And Pluralism: Countering Bias In The Constitutional Concept Of Religion, Elon S. Swartz

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Elected-Official-Affiliated Nonprofits: Closing The Public Integrity Gap, Richard Briffault

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Administrative Adjudicators’ Extrajudicial Statements, Bernard W. Bell

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Norms In Modern-Day Government Ethics, Veronica R. Martinez

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

The Growing Divide Over Criminal Justice Between President Obama’S Supreme Court Appointees, Daniel Harris

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Holmesian Persons And The Administrative State, R. George Wright

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

A New Prescription: The Case For Enterprise Liability Reform In Light Of The Opioid Epidemic, Keith Ongeri

Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy

No abstract provided.

Is The Legal Profession Too Independent?, Limor Zer-Gutman, Eli Wald

Marquette Law Review

Faced with mounting pressure to permit national law practice and increase

access to legal services for those who cannot afford to pay for them and

critiques about growing inequality and its failure to lead the battles for greater

gender and racial justice, the legal profession’s response has been to resist

reform proposals by invoking its independence. Lawyers and lawyers alone,

asserts the profession, ought to determine the pace and details of nationalizing

law practice, set the conditions under which nonlawyers and artificial

intelligence can offer legal services, and respond to growing inequality among

lawyers and concerns about the role lawyers …

School “Safety” Measures Jump Constitutional Guardrails, Maryam Ahranjani

Seattle University Law Review

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder and efforts to achieve racial justice through systemic reform, this Article argues that widespread “security” measures in public schools, including embedded law enforcement officers, jump constitutional guardrails. These measures must be rethought in light of their negative impact on all children and in favor of more effective—and constitutionally compliant—alternatives to promote school safety. The Black Lives Matter, #DefundthePolice, #abolishthepolice, and #DefundSchoolPolice movements shine a timely and bright spotlight on how the prisonization of public schools leads to the mistreatment of children, particularly children with disabilities, boys, Black and brown children, and low-income children. …