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ethics cornerThe Good, the Badand the Ugly WithOnline Reviewsby Carol LangfordAsearch on the businessrating site Yelp for attorneysin San Franciscoyields 5,681 results. AlthoughYelp and similar sites areprobably best suited for restaurantsand night clubs, many people usethe site to review professionals.These reviews influence potentialclients. The Lawyerist.com, a blogfor legal professionals, recentlypolled a thousand people with thequestion: “When you need to finda specialty lawyer, how would youstart your search?” Twenty-two percentsaid that they search Google oranother search engine, 10 percentsaid that they “look elsewhere onthe internet” and 2 percent said thatthey “ask on my favorite social network.”Yelp is not the best indicator of anattorney’s ability—but most peopleusing Yelp don’t know that. Mostexperiences with Yelp reveal thatgenerally bad restaurants get badreviews and good restaurants getgood reviews. However, some placesof business and now some attorneyseither pay people to write goodreviews or ask their dearest friendsto rate their lawyering skills online.Thus, inexperienced lawyers whoare savvy with social networkingcan have outstanding reviews andmore seasoned, but less Internetsavvy,attorneys can have bad reviewsand not even know about it.In some instances, attorneys mightbe rated for things that have nothingto do with their legal abilities.There is really no way to tell whysomeone rated a particular attorneywith high marks.However, the troubling questionis, what can a lawyer do to fightback when he or she receives a negativereview on Yelp? Accordingto some ethics experts: not much.In the Los Angeles County Bar Association’sFormal Ethics Opinion#525, the authors concluded thatany public response to a negativereview online must not “discloseconfidential information,” must“not injure the former client in anymatter involving the prior representation”and must be “proportionateand restrained.” The part about notdisclosing confidential informationcan leave attorneys at a huge disadvantagewhen responding online.Because opinions are protectedby the First Amendment, clients are“The troubling question is, what can a lawyer do to fight back whenhe or she receives a negative review?”usually within their rights to logonto social media sites and trashtheir attorney, as long as they don’tknowingly make false statements—a hard standard to prove. Furthercomplicating matters is the attorney-clientprivilege, which restrictsthe attorney as to what he or shecan say to respond, if that requiresdivulging privileged information.For instance, imagine a client thathired a personal injury attorneywith unreasonable expectationsof receiving millions of dollars insettlement, or a client that endedup slighted in a divorce settlementbecause of his or her own bad behavior.The client could then go onYelp, Avvo, LawyerRatingz.com,Angie’s List, etc., and tell the worldthat the attorney botched the case.In this situation most people wouldreasonably want to defend themselvesagainst these accusations bypointing out the client’s own badbehavior. But as lawyers we cannot.So what can we do?A professional can always sueover a bad review for defamation—30MAY 2013
A GOODREVIEWbut only if the statements made in the review were false.Even then, it’s probably not a good idea. The AssociatedPress recently reported about a Minneapolis Neurologist,David McKee, who sued a patient’s son for defamationafter he wrote a scathing review, including disparagingcomments allegedly said by the doctor to him andhis family following his father’s stroke. McKee claimsthat the statements attributed to him were not true. Thisparticular case has not been decided, but such suits arerarely successful. A study by Eric Goldman, a professorat Santa Clara University School of Law, revealed that ofthe 28 physicians who have recently filed similar suits,16 of them were dismissed and six of them settled.The outcome of such suits can be devastating. In aJuly 13, 2009, article the San Francisco Chronicle reportedabout a California dentist, Yvonne Wong, who sued apatient and Yelp after the patient posted a negative reviewon Yelp’s site. Ultimately, Ms. Wong was orderedto pay more than $80,000 in attorney’s fees to her patientand Yelp. The judge ruled in that case that California’sstringent anti-SLAPP law could be appliedbecause the patient had mentioned mercury fillingsin her review, and thus the review furthered discussionof an issue of public interest.Even Yelp’s spokeswoman Kristen Whisenandrecommends against using the “nuclear option”and suing for a negative review. Why? Because itusually only brings more attention to the negativereview—which is what the professionaldidn’t want in the first place. For example, in2007, the New York Times reported about attorneyJohn Henry Browne who sued the lawyerrankingsite Avvo alleging that his 5.7 (out of10) ranking was damaging to his law practice.A federal judge held that the reviewswere protected under the First Amendmentright to express opinions and dismissed thecase. The case brought more public noticeto the negative Avvo reviews that the attorneywanted removed in the first place.A search of the same attorney now showsthat he was able to raise that number to6.6, so maybe he learned a thing or twosince then. Or maybe he simply becamemore Internet-savvy and learned howto work the system.The best option for attorneys is tocheck the ratings websites, and respondto the reviews in a friendly, proactivemanner. For example, one SanFrancisco attorney with a rating of 2.5 stars on Yelp (outof 5 possible stars) responded to each and every one ofhis negative reviews in a polite manner that did not divulgeprivileged information. Although measures suchas these may seem distasteful, the reality is that socialmedia exists, people do check it when searching for anattorney, and the only thing attorneys can do is to stayon top of things. sCarol M. Langford has a practice in State Bar defenseand professional licensing disputes in Walnut Creek.She teaches professional responsibility as an adjunctat U.C. Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law and HastingsCollege of the Law. Additionally, Ms. Langford serves asan expert witness in cases involving complicated ethicsissues and presents at conferences and symposiumsacross the state. She is a past Chair of the CaliforniaCommittee on Professional Responsibility and Conduct.CONTRA COSTA COUNTY BAR ASSOCIATION CONTRA COSTA LAWYER 31
Page 2 and 3: Perry A. NovakSenior Vice President
Page 6 and 7: insideRevolutionizing LawWelcome to
Page 8: The Future of Law in Admissionsto t
Page 11 and 12: have crippled the judiciary’s abi
Page 14 and 15: Growing Trends in Today’s Legal W
Page 16 and 17: Growing Trends,cont. from page 15si
Page 18 and 19: LAW PRACTICE MANAGEMENT SERIES 2013
Page 20: Solo SectionBreakfastFebruary 21, 2
Page 23 and 24: 2013 MEXICO MCLERELAX AND STUDY IN
Page 25 and 26: 1990, it was 15 months; in 2001 it
Page 27 and 28: California lawyers and courts may a
Page 29: 1A virtual law office has been defi
Page 33 and 34: The next Inns ofCourt meetingis May
Page 35 and 36: CALENDARUPCOMING EVENTS | OVERVIEWM
Page 37 and 38: May 29 | CCCBAFast Track Bench/Bar
Page 39 and 40: Interested inAdvertisingin theContr

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