Daily Report journalist Mark Neisse sought Douglas Chandler ’s feedback for the July 12 article, “Gwinnett reaches deal with overbilling lawyer,” about a metro Atlanta attorney who admitted overbilling Gwinnett County for more than $10,000 of indigent client representation.
I was using Siri yesterday to dictate a text, and Apple’s intelligent personal assistant just couldn’t get my message right. Siri thought that my “Motion to Quash” was a request for websites about squash. I was surprised at the number of squash recipes available online, but that wasn’t helping me resolve my issue.
Chandler Law’s Top 10 Tips – Part II
Being involved in a professional liability issue can be one of the most traumatic experiences in an attorney’s career. In my CLE seminar on Risk Management, Legal Ethics, and Professional Liability, we cover many of the things you can do today to avoid these “Houston, we have a problem” situations.
As I mentioned in Part I of this article, these tips were derived from my actual experience defending attorneys against Georgia State Bar complaints and representing plaintiff-clients in professional liability cases.
After extensive review and examination, the American Board of Professional Liability Attorneys (ABPLA) has certified Douglas V. Chandler as a legal malpractice specialist. Mr. Chandler is one of five Board Certified legal malpractice attorneys in Georgia.
On May 7, the ABA Commission on Ethics submitted a series of technology-related proposals to the House of Delegates. These first six proposals for ABA Model Rules updates were the result of a three year study on the impact of technology and globalization on the practice of law. If approved, this will be the first major technology-centric Model Rules update in over ten years – since the launch of the mobile flip phone – so it can be viewed as a significant event.
“I didn’t even know that my secretary did it. They can’t blame me!” This was the start of a conversation I had with another attorney about his Georgia Bar complaint.
What if this had been you? You delegate some fairly routine case work to an assistant or paralegal. The assignment is lost or sent on your behalf without your approval. A deadline is missed or a case goes south. Then your client comes after you with a GA Bar grievance or legal malpractice claim.
The CLE seminar, entitled Risk Management, Legal Ethics and Professional Liability, is focused on helping attorneys improve internal and client communications, minimize risk, and avoid potential issues. The first of these recently updated seminars was presented to an audience of 80 attorneys at a recent Northeast Georgia Bar Association meeting, then to a local Bar group in Dalton, Georgia.
I was recently conducting a CLE seminar on Risk Management, Legal Ethics and Professional Liability for a local Bar Association. When we started discussing updates to Georgia Rule of Professional Conduct 1.4 (Communication), I was surprised that less than 20% of participants knew about the recent Rule update.
The Daily Report sought Douglas Chandler's viewpoints for their March 29 article on the Losey v. Prieto legal malpractice case (12EV104260): "Ex-Client Sues Lawyers for $1.3M." Click here to view the full article and Douglas' comments.
Many of us have been in the situation where we undertake representation, legal work is in process, and then the client has a change of heart and wants to get their file back. Regardless of the reason, whether they are changing counsel, have a change of heart about pursuing their case, or a variety of other reasons, there is a fairly clear set of guidelines that you must follow in order to steer clear of trouble when a client requests the file returned.