The attorney-client privilege is an evidentiary rule that protects certain communications between the attorney and client from a third party’s efforts to discover the content of the communications. Attorneys must have a firm understanding of the full scope of the privilege in order to protect themselves and their clients from improperly disclosing confidential client information in violation of Rule 1.6. However, the attorney-client privilege is often confused with an attorney’s ethical duty of confidentiality – but you must realize that these are two very different legal and ethical principles. The ethical duty of confidentiality provides broader protection than the attorney-client privilege and applies to all information relating to the representation of the client, even the identity of the client in some cases. Unfortunately, many attorneys and even some judges still get tripped up by these two principles.
It is extremely important that you know the scope and coverage of both principles because an unintended waiver of confidentiality or privilege can be the difference between winning and losing your case – and could even result in a serious ethics violation. To learn more, join trial attorney Paul Marks as he discusses how to recognize and avoid unintended waivers of confidentiality and privilege. The main topics covered in this legal ethics CLE course include ethically naming your client, malpractice lawsuits & client confidences, the attorney-client privilege & third party disclosure and the attorney-client privilege in international discovery. Mr. Marks also discusses listing clients & businesses that you’ve represented on your website, press releases & confidentiality clauses, revealing information about clients to third parties, writing books about former clients, designating an in-house ethics counsel inside your firm, billing, interpreters & experts, furthering the interests of the client, the “reasonably related to the representation” standard, the Martha Stewart case, the attorney-client privilege & international litigation and the attorney-client privilege in civil law countries.
Paul Marks has practiced civil and commercial litigation in California for over twenty years. Mr. Marks has served as first chair trial counsel in over thirty cases that have reached verdict, about half of them being jury trials. He recently served as a Delegate to the policy-making arm of the American Bar Association, the ABA’s House of Delegates. In July 2011, Mr. Marks was appointed to a three-year term as a Commissioner on the California Commission on Access to Justice, a State agency comprised of trial court and appellate judges and practicing lawyers and he also serves as an adviser on the Executive Committee of the Solo and Small Firm Section of the California Bar. Previously, Mr. Marks served on the Executive Committee of the State Bar’s Litigation Section, the Committee on the Administration of Justice, and the Litigation Section’s Committee on Civil Jury Instructions. In addition to being a member of the Board of Editors of Los Angeles Lawyer Magazine, Mr. Marks was honored as “Advocate of the Year” in 2008 by Public Counsel, the nation?s largest pro bono law firm.