Recently I have been told the term “legal whore” is talked about in the context of Rhode Island divorce attorneys. My partner and I let it pass and decided not to think much of it until finally, I heard it all over again from someone else in the same context. For unknown reasons, the term kept haunting my family because I failed to know what it meant.
Maybe I am naive as Rhode Island attorneys go, or simply it is a new slang or even a concept in the legal vernacular that I simply hadn’t used. To my surprise, I came across what I believe to be the thing being discussed on these two occasions.
To be clear, Some create this definition, or perhaps coin it, or whatever it takes other than discovering it during trying to place the term inside the context of conversations I always have only partially overheard.
My reasoning and pondering have led me to the conclusion that a “legal whore” as referred to in the talks I heard in Rhode Island, is a Rhode Area attorney who will do nearly anything for money, often provided the conduct does not directly defy the letter of the Rhode Island Professional Rules connected with Professional Conduct.
The idea at this point is that if the attorney at law can make a reasoned controversy that he or she has not violated the laws of professional conduct, then the attorney’s actions are viable even if they are offensive to help others or morally reprehensible to the average person.
The saying struck a nerve by himself and has more value than I would have dreamed. In general, that argument may be made that a legal prostitute is a legal practitioner who will screw anyone over for the money provided they don’t… for not enough a better phrase… get caught together with something… or as the if you happen to would suggest… “catch something.”
I use a case right now that hits a chord with me. I represent an excellent client. This specific client had a child-ready ex-husband. Generally, this person strikes me as a management freak hell-bent on having things the way he/she wants them, regardless of the fee or the damage he leaves in his wake. For a decade, this ex-husband features hired Rhode Island friends and family court lawyers one once the other to haul that poor woman back to the judge to try to have her adjudged in contempt and shipped to the ACI.
In the last courtroom volley, this mother consented to a substantial concession of child help which I estimate may have been around $8, 000 to end this chaos and stop the particular all frustration to her and also aggravation to their child, who will be more than old enough to understand that will her dad is just wanting to hurt her mom.
Within the last few order, it was agreed the standard would be that the pops would be given about 14 days notice of any within visitation for the given four-week period. The order also delivers that if any visitation is missed, it shall sensibly be made up within that calendar year. Keep in mind that the father lives various states away (approximately 5 hours of driving just one way). The exact attorney has been on the case for the father over the past few years and has argued adamantly for his client, even though this Rhode Island law firm is well aware of the dad’s intentions. On each occasion, the attorney has asserted that his client possesses an “arguable basis” for every action that has been pressed and that, as a Rhode Island attorney, the individual must make any such fights for the client.
One particular visitation involved scheduling and transportation problems that arose as soon as the two-week period noted inside Order. The father himself depicted to the child and the mummy (my client) that “this could be the visitation weekend she misses and makes right up later in the year.”
Many months later, the father denies which makes the statement, claims he wasn’t given the two weeks detection, and now is having his attorney at law press a motion to help adjudge the mother in willful contempt and to either okay her or sentence your girlfriend to the ACI to teach the woman a lesson. The father expressed directly to the kid that this is precisely what he or she is doing to the mother. Still, since he has done in the past, he’ll take the stand in court and prepare a vehement and effective denial that he ever mentioned anything.
Without question, I have no difficulty expressing that I have zero respect or compassion regarding fathers who act in a destructive manner for more than a decade once the divorce is over. However, it is even more troubling to know that the attorneys representing this particular man do so under the assumption that they are protected by the Rhode Island Rules of Expert Conduct. In the circumstances, for example, these an attorney is not avoided from taking on such a situation nor are they curbed off their zealous advocacy for their customer, but rather the Rhode Tropical isle Rules of Professional Do impose a duty involving zealous advocacy on the legal professional for any matter that he or she decides to undertake, provided there is a controversial basis, in rules, or by a reasonable disagreement for he modification involving existing law.
A Rhode Island Divorce or Household Law attorney may then if they find any arguable base whatsoever, no matter how small, have to advocate zealously for the protection under the law of his or her client if they undertake the representation of the client in the matter.
By far, the most troubling factors here are two-fold. First, as attorneys looking for the right to refuse cases. It is our livelihood, and we may well accept and reject the actual cases we want to handle. Therefore in the first instance, it becomes a matter of option for the attorney. Now, it is perhaps understandable that a lawyer might first undertake a customer in what appears to be commendable, warranted, or just cause each time the attorney is unaware of all the facts and conditions. In these instances, I believe it might be improper to refer to those lawyers as either disreputable or even as “legal whores” because this blog article has been mentioned as the subject.
The problem arises as to the reputation and character of the attorney if he or she continues to symbolize a client who, although she or he may have an arguable state, is not injured by the hypothetical wrong and is simply elevating the issue to injure yet another party.
What, then, could the attorney be to do?
The Specialized Rules of Ethical Do would allow the attorney to remain the representation and remain paid (the attorney’s motivation) or to determine if the legal professional finds the client’s do of such a nature that he/she finds the action currently being instructed by the client being morally offensive or objectionable, such that he or she moves for you to withdraw from the case.
So what on earth then is a legal prostitute? Alas, Mr. Webster hasn’t advanced his wisdom to date, so I am left to take a position as to what it is to my mind.
It is perhaps that the legal whore is a lawyer, who advances a course associated with action for his customer for a purpose other than obtaining the client’s alleged legal rights, but knowing full nicely that the customer intends to achieve some other plan (i. e. punishing someone else by sending them to the actual ACI to teach them the lesson) and not simply to attain what he or she asserts within their court filings is, his / her client’s rights.
I can discover nothing more insulting towards the legal professional that propagates the most popular conception that attorneys tend to be cheats, liars, scoundrels, and they are just out to screw somebody over for a few dollars, as opposed to the scenario I have alluded for you too.
Attorneys who advance a contributing factor based purely upon detailed based argument knowing entire well that the relief looked for is not to resolve the matter or maybe insure the client’s protection under the law, but rather to prolong or maybe delay a court carrying on… or to simply punish yet another party because the means can be taken within the bounds on the attorney’s code of life values… may end up being wealthy.
Ultimately, however, you may wish to consider whether these lawyers are the “legal whores” that hold up the lawful profession to shame and ridicule for remaining within the bounds of their ethics while leaving behind all sense associated with decency, fairness and ethical integrity.
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