Legal Writing

Why Law Firms Need Editors

Law firms need editors for this reason: they’re publishers. They publish client alerts and newsletters, seminar materials and by-lined articles authored by their attorneys. They publish web sites and some publish blogs.

Now, here’s a good example of what happens when there’s no editor between an attorney/author and his target audience:

All of these crimes can carry stiff penalties. In the cases of child pornography and online solicitation of a minor, a conviction for can mean having to register as a sex offender in addition to potential jail time. It is essential to thoroughly investigate all potential factual and legal defenses, police procedure during the investigation, and any possibility your constitutional rights have been violated.

Consider the second sentence:

In the cases of child pornography and online solicitation of a minor, a conviction for can mean having to register as a sex offender in addition to potential jail time.

An editor would certainly strike the errant article and preposition, but he’d do more. He’d make the last phrase (in addition to potential jail time) parallel the one before it (having to register as a sex offender), like so:

In cases of child pornography and online solicitation of a minor, a conviction can mean having to register as a sex offender and serving time in jail.

Why would he do that? For the reader’s sake, and the author’s too.

Full post as published by Set in Style on January 06, 2010 (boomark / email).