Thanks. My kids got it in summary form from their NYT email (they had a current events class last term and had to get on the NYT email headlines list, and they still get it now on their computer at home, but I hadn't read the whole thing, and appreciate your remembering that I don't have the NYT so copying it in for me.)
It's a sticky question, frankly. Actually, though, I think this will make little difference for big companies. They will just, I expect, write contracts with the lawyers that prohibit the lawyers from revealing any such information unless it is required by the rules of professional conduct. Since these rule changes merely permit, don't require, those contracts would prevail.
It just puts lawyers in another bind between their clients and the general public, which frankly I don't look forward to. We have a similar rule already in Washington. I'm just waiting for the day when some lawyer doesn't disclose (because he isn't required to), somebody gets hurt, and they sue the lawyer for not disclosing. At the moment, theoretically at least, there's no privity between the lawyer and the injured party, so in theory they party couldn't sue the lawyer. But I expect some bend-over-backward-liberal-court (probably California's) won't be long in finding some loophole to that and dinging a lawyer for not disclosing It will come about in some horrendous situation where a bunch of people including babies or children are killed and the lawyer knew there was a safety issue because the client had disclosed that but the lawyer didn't make it public because he still believed in the rule that it was only permissive, not mandatory, and still believed in the basic principle of confidentiality, and didn't disclose.
You have a counseling background. Suppose the same rule were in effect for counselors -- that they were allowed to, but not required to, disclose a potential danger not that their client would do directly but that could come about because of the client's actions, and if revealed would bring negative consequences to the client, but it not revealed could lead to innocent bystanders getting hurt or killed. (Badly put, but you get the idea.) What should a counsellor do? |
