By Jeanne M. Huey  © 2023 by the American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association.  On October 19, 2023, Sidney Powell, Donald Trump’s former lawyer, pled guilty to six misdemeanor counts of conspiracy to commit intentional interference with performance of election duties according to Politico. Under the plea deal, Powell was sente ..read more

Today’s post was authored by my partner, Richard M. Hunt. Ethics Implications of Dobbs for law firm management and client counseling              The Supreme Court’s opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has triggered direct threats of prosecution directed to law firms that adopt policies aimed at providing abortions services to their staff. Those threats and coming legislation across the country raise important issues of professional responsibility for attorneys and firms whose conduct is pe ..read more

Step 1: Ask for What You Really Need  From international banks to local pharmacies, third parties routinely provide documents and testimony needed to prove a case. At the same time, many clients want to preserve relationships with some of these third parties for after the lawsuit is over. To best serve our client’s interests in winning and preserving relationships requires careful application of ethics rules, procedural rules, and good manners.  Every third-party request starts with a practical and ethical question: “Do I really need this information?” Is it crucial to your client’s ..read more

Model Rule 1.1 (competency) and Rule 1.4 (communication) govern a lawyer’s duty to effectively communicate with their clients. A recent ethics opinion from the ABA—ABA Formal Opinion 500—makes the obvious point that these duties are not diminished when you have a client with whom you cannot communicate due to a language or other barrier. The Opinion, however, leaves out important considerations and provides an impractical standard for the real world practice of law. The Opinion fails to recognize the legal duty to communicate with disabled clients First, the Opinion do ..read more

Things are happening in Texas courts, at the State Bar, and in the Texas Legislature that could affect your practice. Here are three things that you should know about today: Here We Go: Texas Courts Are Now Allowed To Proceed with In-Person Hearings and Jury Trials. On March 5, 2021, the Texas Supreme Court issued its 36thCOVID-19 emergency order. Finally, the prohibition against in-person proceedings, including jury trials, has been lifted, albeit only in certain circumstances and after certain protocols are put in place locally. This is a bit of good news for litigation clients who have ha ..read more

Due to Covid-19 most lawyers are working remotely–and many are feeling a bit isolated. Some lawyers report an inability to concentrate on their work for any length of time; others complain that they miss interacting with their colleagues at the office, in court, and at Bar activities and events. Enter, Lawyer Well-Being Week, sponsored by the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being and many partner organizations. Lawyer Well-Being Week takes place May 4-8, kicking off May, which is National Mental Health Month. Click on the link above to access all the resources and tips for the wee ..read more

So. Much. Advice. As lawyers, we are inundated with helpful information about practicing law during the pandemic that is Covid-19. Rather than give you something else to read, check out my recent podcast (8 minutes) recorded for the ABA Section of Litigation Ethics and Professionalism Committee. The link is here. Stay safe ..read more

It is probably just a matter of time before Texas joins the list of states who are declaring a state of emergency due to the number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus known as “Covid -19” (the Virus). Even so, this is no time to panic–it is time to prepare. Prepare to protect your practice so that you can continue your work for your clients as seamlessly as possible no matter what happens—and do so with minimal risk of violating your ethical duties. This is exactly what the United States District Court Chief District Judge Rodney Gilstrap* did when he issued a new Standing Order for t ..read more

We have all tried to ignore the warnings about our ethical duty to be competent in the technology we use: The articles and emails about data breaches and hacking of law firms Texas Ethics Opinion 680 with its (incredibly long and seemingly impossible to achieve) laundry list of “reasonable precautions” Texas lawyers should take in order to meet our duties of confidentiality and competence and Comment 8* to Rule 1.01, which makes it crystal clear that Texas lawyers are required to be competent in all forms of technology that they (and their firms) utilize But no longer.  The headline las ..read more

I recently wrote an article for the UNT Dallas College of Law publication Accessible Law. The publication is aimed at educating the public on various legal issues.  My article, “Understanding Court-Appointed Attorneys for Children in Family Law Cases” also includes a nifty infographic that contains nearly all the information from the article for those who prefer a shorter read. The article is aimed directly at the questions that litigants and family members may have about court-appointed attorneys.* It brings to mind all the years I spent practicing family law and dreading ..read more