If you have ever been in the unfortunate situation where you need the help of a good attorney, then you know how gracious they can be. It is possible that your marriage is falling apart and you have children that you need to resolve your visitation rights; Or maybe you’ve been injured in an accident and need assistance filing a claim against the at-fault party. No matter what your need is, the right attorney can help make the entire process much easier.

However, despite all the good work that many lawyers do, there are a lot of lawyers operating on the other side of the fence. These are the ones who will rip off their clients, ignore and break the law themselves to enrich their own lives.

These same attorneys will use shady moral practices to get questionable results, all of which directly affect you.
“Quis Custodes Ipsos Custodiet”, by the poet Juvenal, which means “Who will watch the watchmen themselves”, is an old Latin saying that perfectly sums up this situation. It’s extremely apt in these situations, because if we can’t trust our protectors. to really protect ourselves, what can we do? Who punishes lawyers when they break the law?

Scary stats

Although you may believe that attorneys who break the law are in the minority, the number of incidents that have been made public is on the rise. Some of the most recent examples of this are:

o In 2001, a total of ELEVEN attorneys in Tennessee were still practicing law, despite a list of charges against them that included bank fraud, perjury, and even one attorney guilty of failing to provide evidence, resulting in an innocent man to serve four years in prison on a rape charge.

o This year in Warren, Ohio, a lawyer was charged with fraud, including cheating an elderly woman out of more than $80,000

o Also this year, two attorneys in Boise, Idaho were convicted of shocking financial dealings related to their purchase of real estate at University Place.

However, despite these findings, and the culprits acknowledging their criminal behavior, they are still allowed to work and practice law. Why is this and what can you do about it if it affects you?

The censorship debacle

As a child grows up, and if he does something wrong, we as parents punish him; that’s how we’ve all learned right from wrong. The same thing happens in our adult life: we all know that if we break the law, we will be punished. Depending on what we have done wrong or what we have been accused of, the punishment can vary, from an official warning for something minor, losing the driver’s license for a traffic violation, spending time in jail for embezzlement or something even more serious. There are even times when someone has spent time in jail when they were actually innocent.

However, the same set of laws does not seem to apply to lawyers. When they do something illegal, as a rule, it doesn’t seem to affect their work too much, because they are still allowed to practice law. Still, if they are punished in a more severe manner, you can bet your bottom dollar that it will not be as severe as we would be treated for the same crime.

The justification for this is something that lawyers love to resort to, and that something is censorship, a convenient scheme of publicly berating someone without really making anything official. Sure, when you hear that a lawyer has been “publicly censured,” it may look and sound good on paper, but it’s actually quite the opposite. The only thing that happens is that a public official, or if someone of importance receives a warning, it’s like being slapped on the wrist and told not to be mean again. It’s not exactly inductive to make someone change her ways. However, it is not only this that is wrong here.

The old school tie net

When any type of law is broken, if it goes to court, it is usually the lawyers who will work to make sure that the judges set the correct type of penalty. However, if you are dealing with a lawyer who is on trial (although this in itself can be difficult to achieve, thanks to the censorship procedure), then you can ensure that an old friend or colleague from law school takes your case. .

As if that weren’t bad enough, you’ll find that the lawyer is probably a friend of the judge hearing the case, which doesn’t build confidence that the case will be tried fairly or with impunity. It is this kind of “all for one, one for all” attitude that has caused the public’s faith in lawyers to drop to an unprecedented level, which is a particular embarrassment to good lawyers who do their job well and take care of the people who matter. – Your clients.

If you have been the victim of lawyer negligence, there are ways to bring them to justice, and not just let them go down the normal route of censure and favors from friends to get them off the hook.

Taking the law in your hands

One avenue you can take to bring the offending attorney to justice is through the state boards of government that are supposed to be responsible for allowing attorneys to operate in a particular state or county. Unfortunately, this can be tremendously expensive and is often a very long process, which is not always successful, because the lawyer can appeal and usually the accuser does not know and cannot speak against you again. While the appeal continues, they are allowed to continue practicing law… ergo, the lawyer gets away with it.

Another way you could consider is using another attorney, which may sound strange since you are making a case against another attorney. However, just like any job and vocation, there are some exceptional attorneys who would love nothing more than to successfully indict and prosecute someone who is ruining their business and good name in such a negative way.

If you are not sure where to start, there is usually a lawyer referral service in your city or you can go online and do a search with Google, Yahoo or MSN where you will find lists of firms in your city that would be more than willing to accept. these types of cases.

Another option is to go to the local and national press. People hate to think that those meant to protect our rights act criminally, and they hate it even less when it comes to a lawyer using the law to further enrich his own way of life. For that reason, you should get all your facts and dates out to the press, who would love to go after these law-breaking attorneys for you.

No matter what you decide to do, please don’t sit back and expect the lawyer to get caught without your help, that’s why there are so many bad guys on the loose in the first place.