Sorted by Commenter - Ethics - State of California

Conflicts
The Proposal fails to account for the conflict situation in many civil and criminal
litigation matters where accepting a particular client in a case precludes the lawyer from
representing a number
retainer is designed and intended to solve specific problems in a multi-defendant case. It
is not unusual in these cases for there to be anywhere from six to twelve people charged
in a complex fraud or controlled substance case. Often, if not most of the time, there are
conflicts between and among the
person eliminates the lawyer from consideration in representing any other
potential co-conspirator who may later be charged, or any
Lawyers are quite often
publicized
possibility of representing any number of other people who may request to be represented
by the law
investigated or indicted in the future in a related matter.
In addition, in the field of , the lawyer or law firm
accepting a client not only often forecloses representation of any other parties involved in
the pending transactions, but may also be precluded in the future from representing other
major clients in transactions that come to fruition years later.
account for the special knowledge, experience and ability an attorney may have already
acquired on an issue or area of the law, which might otherwise have to be gathered at the
expense of a client with a less
legitimate bases for
justifying nonrefundable retainers.
Setting out in a fee the fee agreement does not alter the client'
right to terminate the (see Rule 1.5(e)(iv)) and also that the
client " may be entitled to a refund" (see Rule
lawyer, have the lawyer work on the case for
lawyer without cause, demand a refund, and then prevent the lawyer from
anyone else in the litigation or
permitted to terminate the lawyer for cause, the lawyer and the client should also be free
to ensure that a satisfactory fee arrangement has been negotiated to cover the contingency
of a discharge without good cause. This problem is further
the true retainer the lawyer must be
compensated for "any services provided. See Comment (8). The small fee
availability will most often never compensate the lawyer or law firm for being unable to
represent anyone else related to the case.
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