Handcuffs, Handcuffed Hands Vector Illustration—Vectorportal (Flickr.com)
Can you imagine any profession where someone can lose their ability to earn a living because of the price they charge? The free market people must be freaking out. Can your florist be told by the government that their price for roses has cost them their job? Is that American?
How about the other side? Can any profession charge whatever they want? I am not sure. I think there are some restrictions on health care prices after Obamacare and regulations on electricity/energy companies that take government money/monopolies. I am not really sure, though. I can’t think of any profession that is regulated like lawyers.
An attorney was recently suspended for charging a flat fee instead of an hourly rate!
Who regulates lawyers? The bar association of the state regulates attorneys in that state.
You must be thinking that the guy this lawyer represented must have been a wrongly accused priest, right? Wrong. The guy traveled to a city with the intention of having sexual contact with a person he believed to be a 14-year-old girl with whom he had been chatting online. The girl actually was an undercover Clinton County’s Sheriff’s deputy, according to the Quad City Times, and the Clinton County District Court dismissed the charge against Halverson after a federal charge was filed. The accused retained a different attorney to represent him in federal court, according to court documents.
Vilmont spent only 3.7 hours on the case and made $2500. What is the big deal?
William Vilmont, the attorney, got a 30 day suspension for charging a $2,500 nonrefundable retainer. This is big government at its worst.
Flat fee pricing has been all of the rage in recent years. It works better for the client, in many circumstances. Here is an article from this week: Attorney Kendall Jones Launches Flat Fee Legal Services Business PR.com press release. So, should they be disbarred? I don’t think so.
I always think something is up when strange things happen. Something is more than it seems. We don’t know facts that are on the table.
Had the fee been labeled a flat fee which was nonrefundable, would there be a problem? Hard cases make bad law. This is a case that has bad law thrusted upon it. I do flat work fee. Some cases I make more per hour, but some cases I make less. At times I have to do more that I orginally thought when I took the case. Other times my attorney fee being flat worked to my advantage. I took the risk. The client took the risk. That is our business. That is our business deal. This is America. We have freedom to contract over legal goods and services. This is an activist court going to far.
The one thing that stands out to me is the fact that this is a conservative state. How can conservatives interfere with the free market and the right to contract. Unbelievable.
By the way, the guy this attorney represented got 10 years in federal prison. Stay classy, guys. Look whose side you took!
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WHAT DO YOU THINK? BUSINESSMAN OF THE YEAR OR CROOK? TELL US WHAT YOU FEEL! DARE YOU
What do you guys think? Is is about disclosure or hatred for lawyers? What do you think?
I have to take a second to comment on your story because you left out some critical information. First, the lawyer in question did NOT charge a flat fee. He charged $225 an hour. He also asked for a retainer in the amount of $2500.The $2,500 retainer was placed in a trust. So far that is fine. This lawyer then told his client that there was a MINIMUM charge of $2500 for representation. His client’s charges were dismissed, WITHOUT HIM HAVING TO DO A THING, because the guy was going to be charged in federal court. The lawyer provided an accounting of his alleged charges to the ethics panel and he only put in 3.7 hours of work according to what he told the ethics panel – even though he didn’t go to court for his client. That seems excessive considering the fact that he didn’t go to court and didn’t have to do any prep. However, even that 3.7 hours wasn’t cut and dry. You see he included 1 hour for preparing the paperwork for the ethics case! HE DIDN’T EVEN GO TO COURT FOR HIS CLIENT. After his client’s case was dismissed, he withdrew the $2500 WITHOUT giving his client a full accounting. In fact, he immediately withdrew it before his client even had a chance to contact him about it. AFTER he withdrew the money, his client contacted him and he would not take the calls. He wasn’t in trouble for charging a flat fee. He was in trouble for being unethical. THAT is a COMPLETELY different thing! I would say that he didn’t behave ethically. Wouldn’t you?
If you think that a lawyer should be paid SIMPLY because he was retained when he did NO WORK for the guy, then you are crazy! That is unethical. If I were a lawyer and my client’s case was dismissed without me doing anything, I would charge for one hour and return the rest of the money because that is the ethical thing to do. I wouldn’t try to keep the entire $2500 if I didn’t do a darn thing. That is just wrong.