The VLW Blog

Lawyers, be reassured. You’re not violating any attorney-client responsibilities if you report an Internet scam attempt to law enforcement. That’s the word from Virginia State Bar Ethics Counsel Jim McCauley, who says he’s fielded calls from two lawyers in the past week wondering if they should report scam attempts after agreeing to undertake representation for [...]

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The Virginia State Bar wants to know what you think about the fitness of Del. Joe Morrissey, D-Henrico, to practice law. Morrissey has petitioned the VSB to restore his license, which was revoked in April 2003, and a hearing on the request is set for April 22. The state bar is asking for written comments [...]

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The Virginia State Bar website now has a third button to click to check on the status of an attorney – “Attorneys Not in Good Standing.” That button supplements buttons for “Attorneys Without Malpractice Insurance” and “Disciplined Attorneys.” In most instances the new button duplicates the information available by clicking the “Disciplined Attorneys” button, but [...]

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The Virginia State Bar Disciplinary Board has imposed a public reprimand with terms on former Floyd County Commonwealth’s Attorney Gordon Earl Hannett Jr. The reprimand stemmed from the removal and destruction of three computer hard drives in the prosecutor’s office by Hannett just before he left office and was replaced in January 2008 by Stephanie [...]

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A prosecutor cannot offer a plea agreement to a defense attorney that makes not disclosing the identity of a witness to the defendant a condition of the deal, according to the Virginia State Bar’s Standing Committee on Legal Ethics. The committee said in Legal Ethics Opinion 1854 that Rule of Professional Conduct 3.4(h) prohibits a [...]

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The Standing Committee on Legal Ethics of the Virginia State Bar finally has a formal position on the troublesome issue of using undisclosed recordings to investigate and develop a case. The committee adopted Legal Ethics Opinion 1802, which shifts the focus from a situation in which a lawyer directs clients to make such recordings to [...]

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Security cameras in stores. Employees recording conversations with their bosses. Cameras that catch red-light runners. Police putting GPS devices on vehicles. We live in a “surveillance society,” according to Professor Charles Ess, who spoke Sept. 20 at an ethics symposium on new media co-sponsored by the University of Richmond School of Law. “Game over,” Ess [...]

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The Virginia State Bar now offers a Web-based form for submitting ethics questions to the VSB Ethics Counsel’s office. Clicking a bright blue button on this page opens the form where attorneys can identify themselves and type in a question for the VSB gurus. The ethics inquiries land in a new e-mail inbox at the [...]

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In an unpublished order, the Supreme Court of Virginia today upholds the 12-month suspension of Norfolk lawyer Curtis Tyrone Brown’s license to practice law. A three-judge panel concluded that Brown made a false statement to a judge and disrupted a judicial proceeding. Brown misrepresented to a Chesapeake Circuit Court judge in front of a jury [...]

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The Virginia State Bar Committee on Legal Ethics has trouble imagining a circumstance when sex with a client would not be a violation of legal ethics but stops short of finding such a relationship to be unethical per se in Legal Ethics Opinion 1853. After outlining the manifold ethical problems created by having sex with [...]

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