State Bar urges client sex prohibition

With only two negative votes, the Virginia State Bar Council has endorsed an explicit ban on lawyers engaging in sexual relations with clients. The only exception is if the intimate relationship predates the lawyer-client relationship.

The VSB has prosecuted lawyers who had sex with clients, but has done so using a provision regulating conflicts of interest. An existing legal ethics opinion concludes that a lawyer should “refrain from” sex with a client, but does not prohibit the practice. The VSB Ethics Committee said more definitive guidance is needed.

Ethics Committee chair Dennis Quinn told Bar Council members April 21 that divorce lawyers consistently encounter clients who complain of unwanted overtures from previous counsel.

“There’s a good argument that, in those circumstances, there is no such thing as consent,” Quinn said.

If the client wants to end the personal relationship, and the lawyer objects, “That puts the client in a horrible position,” Quinn said.

The Bar Council voted 54-2 on April 21 to recommend the Supreme Court of Virginia adopt the prohibition on client sexual relations with new language in Rule 1.8.

The Council recommended new language to the rules on Mandatory Continuing Legal Education that would allow education on professionalism to include material on “elimination of bias.” But council members rejected a suggestion that lawyers be required to attend bias elimination sessions.

A proposal from VSB President Brian Buniva that the bar provide law practice management assistance has been tabled. A committee concluded the idea had merit, but would conflict with a recent initiative of the Virginia Bar Association and could result in a dues increase.

The Bar Council also voted to pursue removal of a sunset provision from the Virginia Code restricting the authority of the Supreme Court to levy assessments for the Clients’ Protection Fund after 2023. The fund is sound and officials expect the assessment to drop to just $5 this year, but CPF leaders contend the court should have discretion to decide how to support the fund.