Hello Students! I hope you enjoyed our very “ETHICAL” discussion today. 🙂 By 8am Tuesday, April 4, please read the rest of ch. 4 (pp. 100-118) (in addition to the first part of ch. 4, previously assigned). Then, on p. 117, choose any ONE of the following questions and answer it in in a “reply” to this post: Ethics Question 1 OR 2, OR Practice Question 4 OR 5! Be sure to identify which question you are answering! We’ll discuss your thoughtful responses in Tuesday’s class!
KC
For the ethical question assignment, ill be choosing Ethics Question #1. In this situation, Norma should remain professional. She should not endanger her professionalism, by doing an unauthorized practice of law. All ethics codes for paralegals state that “A paralegal shall not engage in the unauthorized practice of law”. (Exhibit 4.1) Helping them from becoming liable for negligence. Afterward, Norma should report Linda to the law firm supervisor. For trying to instigate into breaking an ethic code for paralegals.
Thanks Francisco! Yes Linda put Norma in a difficult position.
Practice Question #4 Matthew has to obey UPL rules and regulations and He should legally tell Samantha that he can’t give her the answer to that because he is not an attorney and he can’t give set out legal fees. He has to tell her she has to speak to an attorney about her monthly child-support payments.
Thanks Tiffany, that’s wise advice!
Practice Question #4 Matthew has to obey UPL rules and regulations and He should legally tell Samantha that he can’t give her the answer to that because he is not an attorney and he can’t give set out legal fees. He has to tell her she has to speak to an attorney about her monthly child-support payments.
For ethic question number 1 Norma should not sign the document and remember her position as a paralegal and avoid committing unauthorized practice of law. Since she can’t sign the document she should report the issue to a supervising attorney.
Thanks Aliya!
Ethical question 2.
Yes the law firm is guilty of a ethical violation because they did not uphold there duty to provide client confidentiality and keep there information safe. They failed to secure the client’s information in a safe network/cloud server. And they did not mention that they changed their server to the client. The firm not upholding there duty led to the clients personal business being out there and it may have defamed there character
Thanks Davida, that’s a thorough analysis!
For ethical question #1
The first thing that Norma should do is let her attorney know about that situation and say that she is sorry but cannot ethically sign that paper because she is not an attorney she is just a paralegal . Even if its only two people that are aware that the document is falsely sighed it would still involve the attorney that is unaware if the signing and that is unethical.
Thanks Ben! I agree, this is not a “victimless crime.”
Ethical Question #1
Norma should at all costs maintain her professional integrity by adhering to ethical behavior regarding this request. She should let the attorney know that she would be unable to sign this document as it would constitute an unauthorized practice of law (UPL). Furthermore, Norma should inform her that she is not prepared to compromise her integrity or violate her professional ethics. If possible Norma could let a more senior attorney aware of this request.
Thanks Liesl!
Practice Question #5
The ethical violations they committed were splitting the fees the attorney charged the clients. It is unethical for the paralegal to directly share in the fees from the clients because as we can see in the same example, this creates incentive to find more and more clients since it is now akin to a commission based pay.
The paralegal is using the attorney’s name and stamp to file court documents without the attorney’s knowledge, and this could be seen as UPL.
The attorney is violating their Duty of Competence. They are counting too much on the paralegal who is experienced in this area of law, but they aren’t learning about it themselves. They aren’t doing their research on this area of law that they aren’t as knowledgeable in.
They are also violating their Duty to Supervise because they are allowing the paralegal to use their stamp and name to file documents without the attorney reviewing them at all. They are not adequately supervising their paralegal and checking in on their work.
Thanks Jessica! Yes this paralegal and attorney have racked up quite a few violations.
Ethics Question
Question 1: Answer- Norma, in this situation I think has three ethical decisions at her disposal that directly correlate with each other. She should either be forthright and tell lawyer that she won’t be signing the document because the lawyer is breaching the duty of competence. i.e. being knowledgeable and thorough in performing your job. If there’s a pushback, just do nothing and/or inform the firm of the Linda’s request and an illegitimate signature can have an adverse effect one the parties involved. Namely; the client having her case dismissed, thereafter, the client could take action and the paralegal can face civil liability, the lawyer could be sanctioned for violating model rules and possibly face civil liability too and the law firm ultimately would be looking at a dent in the reputation.
Thanks Boyd! These are all challenging options.
For Ethics Question 1 – Norma should not sign the attorney Linda’s name to the document as that would be Unauthorized Practice of Law. Norma was smart to remind Linda of this. Because Linda still knowingly encouraged Norma to commit an ethical violation, Norma should report this to Linda’s supervisor to protect their firm and the other paralegals at the firm.
I chose to answer practice questionss and assignment #1.
In which of the following instances may confidential client information be disclosed?
the correct answer to the question is below
the client in a divorce case threatens to hire a hit man to kill her husband because she believes that’s the only way she can stop him from stalking her. It’s clear that the client intends to do this.