[HSF] Standard of care for lawyers

[Tea Acuff]

I originally thought you were asking what standard of care we should provide for lawyers. The senario that you describe is the alternative golden rule often used by those that state their purpose as the protection of others. That is, those with the gold make the rules.

tea



----- Original Message ----
From: "dukeb60 at aol.com" <dukeb60 at aol.com>
To: OpenHeart-L at lists.hsforum.com
Sent: Wednesday, April 9, 2008 1:28:16 PM
Subject: [HSF] Standard of care for lawyers

?? It has been fairly quiet on the forum so I'll post this recent response from our State Supreme Court to induce some reaction.? As you know, I am a lawyer although I have never practiced law but do have a little more background than the average person and did pass the bar.? I recently had a lawyer handle a case for me in which he performed very poorly and what I considered to be in a frankly negligent manner by not representing my interests and failing to even read some rather pertinent legal materials.? As a result, I filed a complaint with the Counsel for Discipline of our State Supreme court to review his handling of the case.? The response startled even me not so much in the conclusion but the rational for the same, which I will share.? The respondent wrote, 

"Isolated instances of ordinary negligence or errors of judgement do not rise to the level of a disciplinary violation and are not sufficient to warrant disciplinary action.?
?
??As stated in Modern?Legal Ethics (1986):
??? 
????????? To date, the enforcement of competence standards has been generally limited to relatively exotic, blatant, or repeated cases of lawyer bungling.? Lawyers who make some showing of effort, and who do nothing other than perform badly, rarely appear in the appellate reports in discipline cases.? The lawyers who are disciplined for? incompetence have usually aggravated their situation.? For example, several cases involve lawyers who, after their incompetent work, concocted elaborate schemes or lies to decieve a client whose case was mishandled.

?? ... For the above reasons I have concluded, pursuant to Rule of Discipline 9(C), that your allegations against Attorney "X" do not warrant further inquiry by this office."? 

???? So, this is the standard to which our legal professionals are held in their handling of cases.? I am quite certain it is not the same standard to which we, as medical professionals, are held in the handling of our cases.? It is okay to bungle as long as you don't concoct a scheme to conceal the bungling.
? 
As much as it is hard to believe that is actually what a representative of the Supreme Court wrote it is true.? Caveat emptor, clearly, is the rule in law.? While I appreciate the education of a law degree, it is indeed embarrassing sometimes to be one.


??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Ed
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