And I’m always rooting for the business owner. Yelp has become so powerful that fights between business owners and their unhappy patrons become legendary – and oftentimes go viral. That is great power.īut with great power comes great responsibility. Some 45% of people will check a Yelp review before visiting a business. The site reportedly has logged 184m reviews worldwide and 178m unique visitor each month.
YELP REVIEWER STUPID PROFESSIONAL
But you might be tempted to use or disclose client information in other more-benign-seeming settings - like at a social gathering (or Zoom hangout), where talking shop might lead to dishing the dirt on a matter because “after all, it’s ‘of public record.'” In situations like that, the ethics rules should make you think twice.ĭan Bressler’s Risk Blog and The Professional Responsibility Blog also mention this case.Yelp has become the place where people get their food reviews. Retaliatory reviews on social media seem to be a recurrent ethical trouble spot for lawyers.
YELP REVIEWER STUPID PLUS
On these bases, the state supreme court adopted the board’s decision finding a violation of Rule 1.9, and suspended the lawyer for a year, based on that plus other misconduct. And in a previous disciplinary opinion, the state supreme court had found that subpoenaed records from police departments had not become “generally known.” It means that the information has already received widespread publicity.” Merely being “of public record” does not mean that the information is “generally known” when it is not “within the basic understanding and knowledge of the public,” said the New Jersey district court in a 2006 opinion. 479 (2017).Īs the ABA advised, “the phrase ‘generally known’ means much more than publicly available or accessible. The board cited New Jersey state and federal case authority and the ABA’s Formal Opinion No. Here, said the board, the information in the Yelp review the lawyer posted related to the former representation, and the information had not become generally known. Model Rule 1.9(c), like its New Jersey analogue, prohibits using “information relating to the representation” to the disadvantage of a former client with only narrow exceptions, “or when the information has become generally known.” The lawyer contended, however, that the conduct was not unethical because his disclosures “were public information and I did not violate attorney client privilege.” The lawyer conceded that his conduct regarding the client “rating was my finest moment,” said the board. He admitted he was “very upset” by the client’s negative Yelp rating of his practice, and felt that his response was justified because “what was good for the goose was good for the gander.” Well maybe a couple of beers during a massage would be nice.Īfter the client complained, the lawyer sought to explain his actions, according to the board decision. Ooops, almost forgot about the DWI conviction.
Additionally, she has been convicted of shoplifting from a supermarket.
Is a convicted felon for fleeing the state with children. In turn, as set out in the board decision, the lawyer posted a review of the client’s massage business on Yelp, where he said that the client Over a year later, however, the client posted “poor reviews” of the lawyer’s services on several websites. We’ve noted before that just because information relating to your representation of a client might be publicly available, your duty of confidentiality means that youcan’t disclose it if it is not “generally known.” The two concepts - public availability and being “generally known” - are not the same, as a New Jersey lawyer learned earlier this month when the state supreme court imposed a one-year suspension in a disciplinary case that (among other things) involved a Yelp review.Īccording to the disciplinary board’s decision, the lawyer represented a client in a child custody matter and achieved a “seemingly good result” via settlement.
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