@ van: The lead sentence (to be accurate), at least in my judgment, should read: “A lawyer did not violate [his duty of confidentiality] or [Rule 1.6] when he wrote about his cases on the Internet without client consent, a three-judge panel said on June 5. More importantly that is not the court’s ruling. The court ruled that the District Committee deterimination was “contrary to law” as Rule 1.6 was unconstitutional as applied to Mr. Hunter. The Court did rule that Hunter did not violate Rule 1.6, it said Rule 1.6 as applied to his case violated Hunter’s first amendment rights. That’s a significant distinction and another reason why this posting is not accurate.

As far as speaking in public about case results, I agree with you that it would be awkward or unwieldy to use the disclaimer. That is why the lead off language in Rule 7.2 speaks to advertising through written, recorded or electronic communications. The intent is to require the disclaimer where the case results are either read, or in broadcast media, the disclaimer must be displayed with the ad. In person communications are regulated by Rules 7.1 and 7.3, not 7.2.

Van, you shouldn’t be publicizing your client’s cases at a cocktail party, on the Internet or anwhere else, particularly if you are disclosing their actual name, which is what Mr. Hunter did. I assume you would not reveal the actual identity of your clients in those settings. How about this hyopthetical scenario: I put on my website “suppressed 3 pounds of cocaine in the case of Commonwealth v. Ben Glass, resulting in the dismissal of Mr. Glass’s charges.” That’s part of the public record, but to disclose such information is clearly to both embarrass and act detrimentally to the client. I cannot imagine I have the right to say this. And I cannot imagine why Mr. Glass would permit me to publicize that. It may be factually correct, all part of the public record, but clearly inappropriate for me to publicize. Why is it that lawyer so shamelessly put their right of self-promotion over the cleint or former client’s interests to not have their lawyer trash them in the media?

@Ben: there is a difference if the media does the trial report. That’s the media’s job–to report the news. The lawyer’s job is to protect the client, not use their case as a marketing tool without their consent. If the lawyer does the trial report, they should be getting client consent if they are going to disclose facts about the client that would likely be detrimental or embarrassing to the client. Again, the focus seems to be lawyer-centered instead of client centered. Lawyers that care more about protecting their clients instead of their own self promotion don’t make these reports. Let the media properly report the news, but I don’t need my lawyer to be blathering about my case unless I consent. The fact that lawyers blithely ignore these considerations and report case results to the media does not make it ethical. The pervasiveness of ethical misconduct does not transform it into ethical behavior. As the Supreme Court observed in Shea v. Virginia State Bar, the fact that an unethical practice is widespread does not make it any less improper.

To both Ben and Van: As I stated in my first post, your First Amendment rights are not absolute. When you chose to be lawyers you also became subject to the rules of the profession. Rule 3.6 imposes restraints on lawyer speech as does Rule 8.2 and so does Rule 1.6. While free speech interests are important, they are not the only interests the law and society are obliged to protect. Rules 3.6 and 8.2 have withstood constitutional challenge and I suspect Rule 1.6 will also.