Miscellaneous

Stunningly amoral lawyer

With a hattip to Alan Childress over at the Legal Profession Blog comes this tale of a lawyer who interested in both sides of an appeal. Which is, you know, kinda wrong:

Civil defendant-client loses suit due to default judgment from Lawyer's alleged lack of diligence. Client then sues Lawyer for malpractice and also appeals the default. Lawyer then buys out the plaintiff's interest on appeal (gets an assignment of the interest from the prior plaintiff, for some "undisclosed consideration"). That's right: buys into the other side of the appeal and, now represented as a litigant by another attorney in his firm, owns the default judgment if it is upheld. On the other side from his barely-former client, in the appeal!

The Court was, unsurprisingly, unimpressed with this scumbag attorney, finding that his shenanigans "violate[] multiple rules of Professional Conduct as well as the Business and Professions Code." The Court neglects to mention, however, the serious hutzpah something like this takes, and that should count for something, no?

Full post as published by Quiz Law on July 21, 2008 (boomark / email).