March 2013

A few days ago, I wrote about a Georgia Supreme Court decision that left a lot of uncertainty about which legal malpractice claims could be assigned to people or companies other than clients.

Most states do not allow assignment of legal malpractice claims to others for substantial public policy reasons related to protection of the attorney-client relationship.

That may be the shortest-lived Supreme Court decision in Georgia history. This week the legislature passed HB 359 on unclaimed property, into which a succinct amendment had been inserted, to bar assignment of legal malpractice claims. It awaits signature by the Governor.

It

Many prospective clients in serious personal injury and wrongful death claims ask questions about legal fees and litigation expenses in handling their cases. As an Atlanta personal injury trial attorney handling serious injury and death cases across Georgia, and as an individual who remembers very well what it is like to be flat broke and in debt, I am very sensitive to those questions.

The short answer is that in handling personal injury and wrongful death cases for individuals and families, I do not require any money up front from clients whose cases I accept. I evaluate the merits of

This week the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that a voluntary Review Panel reprimand is insufficient discipline for a lawyer who violated client confidentiality in responding to an ex-client’s derogatory comments in a consumer forum website. See In the Matter of Margaret Skinner, Georgia Supreme Court Docket No. S13Y0105.

In the decade since I began blogging here, in either the first or second lawyer blog in Georgia, lawyers participating in blogs, social media, online forums, etc., have sailed somewhat uncharted seas in relation to the Rules of Professional Conduct.

The bottom line, however, has always been that the rules that govern

In a unanimous opinion, the Georgia Supreme Court held Monday that legal malpractice claims may be assigned to other parties in some circumstances, the scope of which remains unclear.

Villanueva vs. First American Title Insurance arose out of a highly unusual real estate closing. A senior attorney hired an associate to work on closings but had a non-attorney employee with signature power on the attorney trust account. The younger attorney was designated as a partner, though that was apparently a bit of a fiction, and handled an $800,000 closing. The mortgage company wired funds to the law firm’s trust account.