Ethics

Emails, text messages, Snapchat: Nobody ever calls anymore. Firing off an email three minutes after somebody made you angry gives rise to any number of issues, one of them being that once the “send” button is hit, electronically stored information (ESI) is created. This panel will discuss the ethical duties to preserve and the discovery duties to produce ESI, and remedies for violations of either — including the duty to refrain from obstruction of access to evidence, the ethical duty to refrain from unlawful alteration or destruction of evidence (spoliation), and the duty to make diligent efforts to comply with discovery requests. Also covered will be the necessary protocols that clients should have in place prior to litigation, remedies for failure to preserve ESI under Fed. Rule Civ. P. 37(e), and other remedies for discovery violations. Amendments to Rule 37(e) (effective December 2015), as well as courts’ and litigants’ experiences with amended Rule 37(e), will also be discussed.

Does an approved fee application shelter counsel from malpractice claims brought by the client? If it does, how do you advise your client about how the application and its approval affects a client’s future claim against you? Does asking for it to be paid pit you against your client and create an unavoidable conflict of interest? Get the tools to navigate these murky ethical considerations.

Join us for another round of the infamous “ABI Talks,” with speakers focusing on topics only a bankruptcy guru could love, such as whether courts delegate too much authority to trustees, spoliation of evidence and ESI issues, ethical obligations between debtor’s counsel and creditors and trustees to their clients, and more!

Avoiding being sued along with or in lieu of your client and avoiding ethical violations and malpractice.

What are bankruptcy crimes, what are the duties of the various parties in a case to investigate and report them, and what are the protections for those who do? The panelists will discuss actual-intent fraudulent transfers and the crime/fraud exception; recent cases suggest that a “fraud” that may trigger the crime/fraud exception to attorney/client privilege and that the work-product doctrine may not be limited to crimes and serious frauds, but rather may include transactions exhibiting only some “badges of fraud,” such as fraudulent transfers (Fragin, Husky International).

It isn’t enough to just be ethical; professionals employed at the bankruptcy estate’s expense have additional responsibilities as well. This panel will explore these additional responsibilities and duties, what they are, and to whom they are or are not owed.

Lien-Perfection Issues; Ethical Considerations for Debtors’ Counsel; Authority to File; Creditor Standing to Prosecute Estate Claims; Cash Collateral/Adequate Protection

Attorney/Client Privilege and the Crime/Fraud Exception; Busting Up “Bankruptcy Remote” Entities

This panel will explore cutting-edge issues dealing with the ethical implications of social media and advancing technology on the practice of law.