Internet Changing the Way Some Lawyers Do Business
Florida attorney L. William Porter II calls himself a “computer geeb”--a cross between a geek and a dweeb--but in truth, he merits a far more elegant description. Such as “legal pioneer.”
Computer compatible for more than a dozen years, Porter now spreads the gospel of cyberlaw. And he’s finding an increasingly receptive audience.
From big-name partners to solo practitioners, lawyers are starting to embrace the potential of the Internet.
No wonder: They can snoop through cyberspace digging up dirt on courtroom foes. They can post queries on global bulletin boards to round up expert witnesses. They can confer with colleagues, study case law, troll for clients or cruise through chat rooms looking for comments that might help them put together a winning case.
“The only thing that bugs me,” Porter said, “is that there’s not enough time to do it.”
Computers haven’t completely replaced old-fashioned legwork. But they’re starting to influence the legal system in ways attorneys find exciting--and, at times, alarming.
A recent class-action suit against Chrysler, for example, coalesced in cyberspace. More than 100 car owners, each thinking they had run into an isolated mechanical failure, swapped stories on the Internet about failed anti-lock brakes. As more and more irate Chrysler owners joined the electronic discussion, each with a similar complaint, they concluded that the problem was far larger than they had suspected.
When they contacted New York attorney D. Brian Hufford for help, he too started networking online. Eventually, he hooked up, via e-mail, with a Chrysler mechanic who supplied him with key information on the anti-lock brakes. Convinced he had a compelling case, Hufford filed the class-action suit in federal court this spring.
“I don’t know if it would be possible to do what we did without the Internet,” Hufford said. “It’s an amazing tool.”
It’s also, however, a risky tool.
The rapid information exchanges that buzz among attorneys and potential clients on the Internet raise sensitive questions about confidentiality, accountability and reliability.
Some skeptics worry that by publicizing minor problems so broadly, chronic gripers may encourage copycat complaints and clog the courts with frivolous litigation. Then there’s the danger that lawyers may compromise a case by spilling too much information during relaxed online chatter.
Business lawyer Parry Aftab, who has offices in New York and New Jersey, recalled one over-eager attorney who asked a legal discussion group for advice on pursuing a slip-and-fall case against a Blockbuster video store. At the time, Aftab represented Blockbuster--so she called and tipped the company off, telling corporate executives they should repair the slippery floor and ready themselves for a legal challenge.
Aftab said she felt bad about violating the trust of the online community, but knew she had an ethical obligation to watch out for her client’s interest. And she figured the anti-Blockbuster crusader should have been more circumspect.
“Everyone knows your next opponent [in the courtroom] may be someone you’re now chatting with online,” said Porter, who moderates an attorneys-only discussion group for the online service Counsel Connect. “That’s all fair in love and war.”
Despite occasional betrayals, lawyers insist there’s much more love than war in their professional circles on the Internet.
To be sure, some attorneys create World Wide Web home pages out of shameless self-promotion. Bar associations in several states, including California, are moving toward regulating Internet advertising to make sure lawyers don’t promise automatic victories or inflate their track records.
Regulators cannot monitor everything, however, and some fear that unscrupulous lawyers will slink through discussion groups hitting up potential clients by e-mailing anyone with a legal problem, in a high-tech version of ambulance chasing.
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But for the most part, lawyers have found--often to their own astonishment--that they shed their ultra-aggressive personas and become kinder, more helpful people when they sit down in front of their keyboards.
Hollywood attorney Robert Brennan said he responds to at least 25 e-mails a week asking questions about medical malpractice, lemon laws or contested insurance claims--all topics he has posted long articles about on his Web page. He would never be as patient with people who tried to wrangle free advice from him on the phone.
“There’s a give and take on the Internet that doesn’t exist when people call on the phone and yammer yammer yammer,” Brennan said.
More and more lawyers are joining that camaraderie. An American Bar Assn. survey to be released later this month found the percentage of small law firms with access to the Internet jumped from 14% last year to 58% this year. Some firms may use the computer only for e-mail, but fully two-thirds of lawyers with Internet access said they used it for legal research. And nearly 15% said they joined private chat groups.
In most of these cyber cocktail parties, lawyers go beyond the most obvious use of computer resources: looking up case law to quote in court. Instead, they ask for more personal help with cases.
They may seek advice on how to handle an expert witness due to testify for the other side. They may even use the Internet to track down transcripts of previous testimony, so they can pick out contradictions to discredit him or her. They may ask colleagues who have dealt with similar litigation for sample court motions or winning arguments.
Surprisingly, they often get what they request.
“Most people think of lawyers as cutthroat competitors, but this computer thing is a way for lawyers from firms of all sizes to cooperate,” said George Dale, a Los Angeles attorney who is setting up a private electronic bulletin board for people involved in defending the construction industry. “From a business perspective, it seems better to be open and share information than to be a money-grubbing attorney.”
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The spirit of online generosity does have the potential to backfire, however.
Aftab worries that when she answers queries online, she might be held responsible for the consequences. She prefers to call her responses “legal education,” but someone out there might think of it as legal advice--and might sue her for malpractice if she blunders.
What’s more, most lawyers are licensed to practice in only one state, so they could run afoul of their bar association rules if they give advice to clients or colleagues across the country.
Even when talking among themselves, attorneys must be vigilant to avoid breeching client confidentiality. Hufford recalls one instance when a private e-mail he wrote to a client in the Chrysler case ended up on a public bulletin board for all to see. It turned out not to betray any confidences, but the lapse dismayed him. “At the time I wrote it,” Hufford said, “I certainly hadn’t intended for it to be published to the world.”
Nonetheless, Hufford found the Internet so effective for building a class-action suit that he’s turned again to cyberspace to find clients for pending litigation against health maintenance organizations. He still insists on old-fashioned phone interviews and document reviews before he decides to trust an anonymous e-mail, but he considers the Internet a key tool.
“Now I have no need to be stretching things” to create a lawsuit from a lone complaint, Hufford said. “I can go out there and find out if it’s a valid claim.”
In a sense, cyberspace networking is a vastly more efficient version of the print advertisements that lawyers have been using to drum up information for years.
The pages of the Advocate, the Los Angeles trial lawyers’ magazine, are filled with requests from attorneys scrounging for evidence to support a client’s complaint: “Need information on . . . unsafe condition of 1992 Geo Prism when impacting deers or humans.” “Information needed concerning dollar amounts of jury verdicts in cases involving consumption of maggot-infested food sold by Sav-On Drugs.”
Such advertisements do work. But their reach is limited. In contrast, a posting on a Web bulletin board zings around the world instantly--and for free. Even the most obscure queries often draw useful responses
Chicago lawyer Ralph D. Davis used the Internet to track down an academic who specialized in the transliteration of Middle Eastern names into Russian, a crucial issue in a case that could hinge on mistaken identity. New Jersey immigration attorney Petro Morgos won his client a new asylum hearing by finding an online expert who would explain why Berber men inducted into the Somalian army deserve special refugee status. And Porter said he saved his client up to $5,000 in research fees when he got an electronic colleague to e-mail him stacks of documents critical to an insurance fraud case.
They all agree with Morgos, who said simply: “I couldn’t have pulled it off without the Internet.”
