Cook County Public Defenders to Share “Guilty Secret” Experience with Lawyer Ethics, Discipline Experts from Across the Country
May 4, 2009, Chicago—The story of two former Cook County public defenders, who for 26 years kept silent about the innocence of a man convicted of murder to protect the confidences of their guilty client, will be retold for lawyer ethics experts from around the country, during the 35th American Bar Association National Conference on Professional Responsibility May 28-30 at the Fairmont Hotel in Chicago.
Dale Coventry and Jamie Kunz will relate their professional dilemma in the Alton Logan case for legal scholars, judges and lawyers who focus on lawyer ethics and discipline during the Chicago conference, which is paired with the 25th National Forum on Client Protection. Mary T. Robinson, former administrator of the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission, will moderate a presentation by Coventry and Kunz, joined by Richard S. Kling, a clinical professor at Chicago-Kent College of Law and former member of the Cook County Public Defender’s Office Special Homicide Task Force, and Ronald Safer, managing partner of Schiff Hardin LLP and former chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of Illinois.
The conferences will cover a wide range of issues, including when conflicts of interests should require judges to remove themselves from considering cases before them, responsibilities lawyers owe to clients after the client-lawyer relationship ends, limits on prosecutorial discretion in lawyer misconduct cases, ethics and liability issues rising from law firm employment practices and lawyer mobility, law school accreditation standards, how the United States and Canada compare in preventing and detecting lawyer misappropriation of client funds, dangers to clients facing potential deportation when unlicensed advocates mishandle immigration matters, and how disciplinary and client protection agencies address depression, addiction and personality disorders among lawyers.
Among other Chicago-area faculty members are Chief Judge James F. Holderman of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois; William Freivogel, a law firm ethics consultant; Christine Anderson, senior counsel to the administrator of the Illinois ARDC, Steve Bahls, president of Augustana College, Rock Island, Ill.; Cynthia Gray, director of the Center for Judicial Ethics of the American Judicature Society; Miranda K. Mandel, responsible for ethics education, compliance and risk management in a Chicago firm; Karen K. Phillips, an expert in legal malpractice insurance; Douglas R. Richmond, a law firm consultant on risk management and loss prevention; Carla J. Rozycki, a labor and employment law litigator; and William P. Schuman, a commercial litigator.
The full conference and forum schedules are available at www.abanet.org/cpr/events/home.html.
Since 1978, the ABA Center for Professional Responsibility has provided national leadership and vision in developing and interpreting standards and scholarly resources in legal ethics, professional regulation, professionalism and client protection mechanisms.
With more than 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is the largest voluntary professional membership organization in the world. As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.
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Editors Note: Media representatives are welcome to cover the conference and forum. Those wishing to attend a May 28 luncheon honoring the late Mary C. Daly, dean of St. John’s University School of Law, with the Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award must register in advance, due to security requirements at the venue. For press credentials, please contact Nancy Cowger Slonim at slonimn@staff.abanet.org, or at 312-988-6132.
