Blogosphere Reacts to Second Circuit Decision on Legal Ghostwriting

A sampling of legal commentary regarding the Second Circuit's In Re Fengling Liu decision, in which the Court decided not to discipline a ghostwriting attorney:

"The Court of Appeals is now saying that lawyers who ghostwrite pro se documents are not violating the professional responsibility rules." - Bergstein & Ullrich, LLP, Second Circuit Civil Rights Opinions

"Clearly, the matter is far from resolved in the courts." - Jane Genova, Law and More

"In a decidedly unsatisfying opinion the Second Circuit ruled that Fengling Liu, an immigration lawyer who, inter alia, drafted the papers submitted by pro se litigants without disclosing to the court that it was her work, did not violate her "duty of candor" to the court...

The problem is that the decision does not hold that unbundling is not unethical...

[T]he court drops a footnote that makes this decision more of a problem than an aid.

However, in light of the importance of the ghostwriting issue, and the fact that the effect of ghostwriting on disqualification issues is not discussed in the ethics opinions described in the text, we recommend to the Court that it consider the amendment of its rules to resolve the matter.

To the extent that Liu found refuge in the confusion, it seems that the court has now given her it's one free pass, and this decision warns everyone else in the Second Circuit that unless and until the rules are clarified, no one can claim confusion as a safe harbor." - Scott H. Greenfield, Simple Justice

"Typically there’s no factual track record demonstrating that these undercover lawyers are causing any harm — like “clients” complaining that they were defrauded — to support these [anti-ghostwriting] decisions and the only impact they have, besides punishing well-meaning lawyers, is to leave a few more people further out in the cold... Ghostwriting is bad for [the law] business, not wrong." - John Toothman, Civilian's Guide to Lawyers