Justia Legal Ethics Opinion Summaries

Century issued insurance to BSA and purchased reinsurance. After BSA made claims related to sexual abuse litigation, Century sought to collect on those policies and hired the Sidley’s Insurance Group. The representation did not extend to the underlying direct insurance; BSA was not a party to the reinsurance disputes. BSA later retained Sidley to explore restructuring; the engagement letter specified that Sidley would not “advis[e] [BSA] on insurance coverage.” Sidley filed BSA’s bankruptcy petition.Through Haynes, its insurance counsel, BSA engaged in substantive discussions with its insurers, including Century. Sidley attorneys were present at some meetings. Century did not object. When Century later objected, Sidley implemented a formal ethics screen between its restructuring team and its reinsurance team. Ultimately, the Bankruptcy Court recognized Sidley’s withdrawal. Century is separately pursuing its grievances about Sidley’s representation in arbitration.The Bankruptcy Court concluded that while Sidley may have received confidential information in the reinsurance matter relevant to BSA’s bankruptcy, no privileged or confidential information was shared between the Sidley's legal teams; it approved Sidley’s retention nunc pro tunc, finding no violation of 11 U.S.C. 372(a). The district court and Third Circuit affirmed. Century continued to have standing and the matter is not moot. Because Sidley’s representation of BSA did not prejudice Century, but disqualifying it would have been a significant detriment to BSA, it was well within the Court’s discretion to determine that the drastic remedy of disqualification was unnecessary. View "In re: Boy Scouts of America" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court approved findings of misconduct made by the Hearing Panel of the Florida Judicial Qualifications Commission (Hearing Panel) concerning Circuit Judge Barbara Kaye Hobbs, found Judge Hobbs guilty to as to one additional violation, and imposed the Hearing Panel's recommended discipline, in addition to ordering Judge Hobbs to pay a fine.The Hearing Panel found Judge Hobbs guilty of the three charges for which she had conceded guilt and one additional charge. The Panel recommended that Judge Hobbs be publicly reprimanded, suspended from office without pay for sixty days, and compelled to attend an employee management program. The Supreme Court accepted the Hearing Panel's findings as to all charges and found, in addition, the Supreme Court held that Judge Hobbs failed properly to supervise her judicial assistant. The Court further added a fine to the Hearing Panel's discipline recommendation and ordered that Judge Hobbs pay a fine in the amount of $30,000. View "Inquiry Concerning Judge Hobbs" on Justia Law

Following a False Claims Act lawsuit against Stericycle, customers were leaving and the price of Stericycle’s common stock dropped. On behalf of the company’s investors, Florida pension funds filed a securities fraud class action against Stericycle, its executives, board members, and the underwriters of its public offering, alleging that the defendants had inflated the stock price by making materially misleading statements about Stericycle’s fraudulent billing practices. The parties agreed to settle for $45 million. Lead counsel moved for a fee award of 25 percent of the settlement, plus costs. Petri, a class member, objected to the fee award, arguing that the amount was unreasonably high given the low risk of the litigation and the early stage at which the case settled. Petri moved to lift the stay the court had entered while the settlement agreement was pending so that he could seek discovery regarding class counsel’s billing methods, the fee allocation among firms, and counsel’s political and financial relationship with a lead plaintiff, a public pension fund.The district court approved the settlement and the proposed attorney fee and denied Petri’s discovery motion. The Seventh Circuit vacated. The district court did not give sufficient weight to evidence of ex-ante fee agreements, all the work that class counsel inherited from earlier litigation against Stericycle, and the early stage at which the settlement was reached. The court upheld the denial of the objector’s request for discovery into possible pay-to-play arrangements. View "Petri v. Stericycle, Inc." on Justia Law

Defendants Patricia G. Olson and Jimmy Dastur appealed a court order disqualifying Steven Bailey, a former El Dorado County Superior Court judge, from representing them in this lawsuit filed by plaintiff Robert Hassett. The trial court relied on rule 1.12 of the Rules of Professional Conduct, finding Bailey’s participation as a judge was personal and substantial in rendering decisions in two other cases involving the validity of options and a purchase agreement for the same real property at issue in the action brought by Hassett. Defendants argued on appeal that: (1) Hassett lacked standing; (2) the disqualification motion was a tactic designed to disrupt defense; and (3) Bailey did not personally and substantially participate as a judge in a “matter” within the meaning of rule 1.12. Finding no reversible error, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "Hassett v. Olson" on Justia Law

In 1994, the Georgia Supreme Court approved State Bar of Georgia Formal Advisory Opinion (“FAO”) 94 -3, which addressed and provided guidance concerning former Standard of Conduct 47 in on whether a lawyer could properly contact and interview former employees of an organization represented by counsel to obtain information relevant to litigation against the organization. In 2000, the Supreme Court issued an order adopting the Georgia Rules of Professional Conduct (“GRPC”) found in Bar Rule 4-102 (d), which replaced the Standards of Conduct. The State Bar’s Formal Advisory Opinion Board (“Board”) determined that the substance and conclusion reached in FAO 94 -3 remained the same under the applicable GRPC. The Georgia Defense Lawyers Association (“GDLA”) raised concerns over FAO 20-1, contending that former employees fall within the “three types of agents or employees of a represented organization who may not be contacted on an ex parte basis by an opposing lawyer[.]” The Supreme Court retracted Formal Advisory Opinion 94-3 and approved Formal Advisory Opinion 20-1, with modifications. View "In re: Formal Advisory Opinion No. 20-1" on Justia Law

Under rules adopted and enforced by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Wisconsin lawyers must join and pay dues to the State Bar of Wisconsin. Active membership in the association is “a condition precedent to the right to practice law” in the state. This regulatory regime, often called an “integrated, mandatory[,] or unified bar,” authorizes the State Bar to use membership dues to aid the courts in the administration of justice, conduct a program of continuing legal education, and maintain “high ideals of integrity, learning, competence… public service[,] and high standards of conduct” in the bar of the state.Attorney File contends that requiring him to join and subsidize the State Bar violates his First Amendment free speech and associational rights. Recognizing that Supreme Court precedent forecloses this claim (Keller v. State Bar of Cal. (1990)), File argued that the Court’s more recent cases—particularly “Janus” (2018)--implicitly overruled Keller. The district court rejected this argument. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Keller “may be difficult to square with the Supreme Court’s more recent First Amendment caselaw, but on multiple occasions and in no uncertain terms, the Court has instructed lower courts to resist invitations to find its decisions overruled by implication.” View "File v. Kastner" on Justia Law

Defendant Mark Bartlett requested the City of Portland to release three city attorney opinions and one legal memorandum. The parties agreed that the documents were public records, were within the scope of the attorney-client privilege, and were more than 25 years old. The city declined to release the documents, arguing that they were exempt from the public records law because of the attorney-client privilege. The specific question presented for the Oregon Supreme Court’s consideration in this case was whether the four documents that were prepared more than 25 years ago by the Portland City Attorney for the mayor and two city commissioners and that were subject to the attorney-client privilege had to be disclosed under ORS 192.390. The Court concluded those documents had to be disclosed. View "City of Portland v. Bartlett" on Justia Law

The City of San Diego (the City) sued Experian Data Corp. (Experian) on behalf of the State of California for violating the Unfair Competition Law (UCL). The City hired three private law firms to represent it in the litigation against Experian on a contingency fee basis. The trial court denied Experian’s motion to disqualify the private law firms. In affirming the trial court, the Court of Appeal found the contingency fee arrangements between the City and the private law firms in a UCL action filed by the City’s attorneys did not violate the prosecutor’s duty of neutrality and therefore did not require disqualification. Further, the Court found agreements to pay the private law firms from any penalties recovered from Experian did not violate Business and Professions Code section 17206’s requirement that all funds recovered in a UCL action be paid to the City’s treasurer. View "California ex rel. City of San Diego v. Experian Data Corp." on Justia Law

In this action challenging the Supreme Court's sealing of the record of the disciplinary action against Judge Adrianne L. Bennett by the Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission the Supreme Court unsealed certain filings in the case but concluded that the Commission's records attached to a mandamus petition should remain under seal.At issue was the order of the Supreme Court disposing of Judge Bennett's petition for writs of mandamus and prohibition in connection with this matter, which the Supreme Court ordered sealed along with all other documents of the proceedings. The publisher of a news entity asked the Supreme Court to unseal the order sealing the proceedings regarding Judge Bennett's mandamus petition and filed a petition to vacate the sealing order. The Supreme Court unsealed the remainder of the filings in this case but held that the records of the Commission attached to the mandamus petition should remain under seal, holding that Judge Bennett had a statutory right to keep that information confidential. View "In re Honorable Bennett" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed various claims against his Defendants, his former attorneys, claiming breach of contract and professional negligence. He also alleges that Defendants failed to advise him of the state’s Anti-SLAPP statute before filing a complaint against a newspaper publisher. Ultimately plaintiff’s Anti-SLAPP claim drew a special motion to strike, which he lost. This, Plaintiff claimed, deprived him of discovery he intended to use in a disciplinary proceeding pending against him in the United Kingdom. In turn, Plaintiff asserts this caused him to lose his law license and suffer other financial harm. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Defendants and Plaintiff appealed.The Second Appellate District reversed. While Plaintiff’s damages claims were too speculative because they were based on the outcome of disciplinary proceedings in the U.K., the trial court erred in failing to consider Plaintiff’s other claimed damages. An attorney owes a duty of care to advise a client of foreseeable risks of litigation before filing a lawsuit on the client’s behalf. Here, Plaintiff presented a viable claim that, had Defendants advised him of the potential consequences of filing his Anti-SLAPP case, he would have elected not to file the claim. View "Mireskandari v. Edwards Wildman Palmer LLP" on Justia Law