Events

This event has been completed.

Event: Wednesday, Jan 27 at 6:10-8pm (ET) Held via Zoom

Hofstra Law’s Monroe H. Freedman Institute for the Study of Legal Ethics presents…

From Rudy Giuliani to Josh Hawley: What is the Role of Lawyer Discipline?

Recently, ethics complaints were filed with state bar disciplinary committees against Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Lin Wood for their conduct related to presidential election litigation and against Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley for their conduct in challenging electors in the Senate. This panel will address whether a state bar disciplinary system is the necessary and appropriate forum to address the allegations of lawyer misconduct especially for conduct outside of litigation. Some claim that filing disciplinary complaints is essential to uphold lawyer self-regulation and respect for the profession. Others claim that the disciplinary process is not appropriate to address such matters.

Join us for an illuminating discussion that will address not only the lawyers’ conduct but also the applicable professional rules and standards of lawyer conduct.

This event is free, open to the public, and will be held via Zoom.

RSVP is required. Registrants will be emailed a link to the Zoom session the day of the event.

Moderator: Ellen C. Yaroshefsky, Howard Lichtenstein Distinguished Professor of Legal Ethics and Executive Director of the Freedman Institute

Panelists:

Dennis Aftergut, Of Counsel, Renee Public Law Group

Dennis Aftergut has won cases of significance in the United States Supreme Court and the California Supreme Court. He is a former federal prosecutor and Chief Assistant City Attorney in San Francisco. During his tenure with the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office, he was named a “Lawyer of the Year” by California Lawyer Magazine for his work defending San Francisco’s Equal Benefits Ordinance. He currently focuses on affirmative litigation and defending cases involving civil rights and democratic norms under attack. Read more

Ellen C. Brotman, Attorney at Law, Brotman Law

Ellen Brotman, Esq. is the founder of BrotmanLaw in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her practice focuses on professional responsibility, and ethics, investigations, white collar criminal defense and appellate advocacy. Ms Brotman has represented lawyers before the Disciplinary Board of Pennsylvania for over 20 years and has defended a wide variety of criminal cases, including political and public corruption, corporate securities fraud, tax fraud, money laundering, currency structuring and other white-collar crimes involving complex trial, sentencing and appellate issues. Read more

Bruce Green, Louis Stein Chair of Law, Director, Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics, Fordham University School of Law

Bruce A. Green is the Louis Stein Chair at Fordham Law School, where he directs the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics. He teaches and writes primarily in the areas of legal ethics and criminal law, and is involved in various bar association activities. Currently, Professor Green chairs the ABA Criminal Justice Standards Committee and the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination drafting committee, and is a member and past chair of the NY State Bar Association’s Committee on Professional Ethics. Read more

Rebecca Roiphe, Trustee Professor of Law, Co-Dean for Faculty Scholarship, New York Law School

Rebecca Roiphe is the Trustee Professor of Law and Co-Dean for Faculty Development at New York Law School where she teaches Professional Responsibility, Criminal Procedure, Ethics in Criminal Practice, and American Legal History. She runs the Institute for Professional Ethics and is a co-director of the Criminal Justice Institute at NYLS. Professor Roiphe holds a JD from Harvard Law School and a PhD from the University of Chicago in American History. She writes on the history of the legal profession and prosecutorial ethics. Her opinion pieces on prosecution, legal ethics, and politics have appeared in Slate, the New York Review of Books Daily, Politico, and USA Today among other popular press. She is a legal news analyst for CBS News and has also served as an expert on MSNBC and CNN.

For more information, contact Deborah Grattan at Deborah.J.Grattan@hofstra.edu.

The Monroe H. Freedman Institute for the Study of Legal Ethics, founded in honor of one of the profession’s most influential legal scholars, seeks to focus the attention of law students, scholars, judges and practitioners on today’s most significant issues for the legal profession.

The Freedman Institute sponsors programs and conferences for scholarly inquiry and brings together practitioners, judges and scholars to examine critical aspects of the delivery of legal services.

It also trains law students to take responsibility for serving others, and it provides practical experiences to do so.

Monroe Freedman schooled generations of law students and implored colleagues to “make a difference.” The Freedman Institute seeks to enhance his legacy.

Ellen C. Yaroshefsky, Howard Lichtenstein Distinguished Professor of Legal Ethics and Executive Director of the Freedman Institute

Deborah Grattan, Legal Ethics Coordinator

This event has been completed.

Event: Thursday, Dec 3, 2020 at 1:00 PM (ET)

Ethical Internal Investigations: Protecting the Company, the Individual and Yourself

Ellen C. Brotman of BrotmanLaw moderated a panel of three white collar lawyers on the issue of Ethical Internal Investigations: Protecting the Company, the Individual and Yourself.  The panel was presented by LawLine and explored ethics issues that arise in conducting internal investigations, including the determination and resolution of conflicts, preserving privilege and the importance of joint defense agreements.

Moderator:   Ellen Brotman, Owner, Founder, Attorney, BrotmanLaw

Co-Panelists: Susan Bozorgi, Esq., founder of the white-collar boutique, Bozorgi Law in Miami, Florida;  Nicole A. Phillips, Esq., former AUSA and partner in the White-Collar Department at Montgomery McCracken; Preston Pugh, Esq., former AUSA and in-house counsel of a Fortune Ten company, and a partner at Crowell Moring’s Washington D.C. office

This event has been completed.

Event: Tuesday, June 9, 2020 at 12:00 PM (ET)

Fee Agreements, Bank Accounts, Record-Keeping, and Succession Planning: What You Don’t Know Will Hurt You

Sleepless nights are a criminal defense attorney’s lot in life, full of worry about all of the things that can and do go wrong in the high stakes world of protecting an individual’s liberty.  But there is one other thing that you should be worried about — your office’s compliance with the Rules of Professional Conduct and the Rules of Disciplinary Enforcement that apply to fees, fee agreements and banking. This ethics webinar will cover the conduct that may expose you to discipline relating to the handling of money.  And if you are ready to give up those sleepless nights, this webinar will also address the Rules of Professional Conduct 1.1 and 1.3 and provide guidance on succession planning in both exigent and non-exigent circumstances. Specifically, this webinar will discuss the ethics of succession planning in three acts: the planning process, which exit to choose, and managing your retirement with the Office of Attorney Registration.

Moderator:  Phil Gelso, Attorney, Law Offices of Philip Gelso

Speaker:  Ellen Brotman, Owner, Founder, Attorney, BrotmanLaw