Indeed, I will not be making the sacrifice minty green is making by doing pro bono work. Such work is indeed totally without compensation. Now, I do think that such work ought to be compensated for by organizations with an interest in seeing those people get the representation they need, but I’m not in position to change the world like that or to expect such a change. If minty green is in a position where he can do that without compensation, all the best for him.
I went to law school for the sole purpose of being able to help people solve problems, that’s basically a lawyer’s job. I hope to do that for impoverished criminal defendants (public defender’s office) or people embroiled in legal conflicts to whom the system seems menacing, large, and mystifying (legal aid.) That said, I certainly cannot make it through the year without some compensatory salary. All the best to those who can for doing a valuable and needed service to the community, but I could hardly expect that of anyone. It goes above and beyond, as tomndebb says.
I won’t expect pats on the back for what I do, coz I’ll be getting paid (though signifigantly less than my big-firm counterparts.) It’s what I want to do, I wouldn’t satisfy my own drives and desires with anything else. minty green is indeed going beyond what I think I could personnally expect from a lawyer, knowing the life we lead.
No one’s saying anything bad about you or your choice to go into public service law, RexDart. More power to you–it’s a very selfless path to take, and you’ll be doing a hundred times the small amount of good I manage to do in squeezing in a few odd pro bono representations. But I think you’ll find that even in the PD’s office or Legal Aid, you’ll still have the chance to do pro bono work apart from your normal employment, whether its through an adoption program or assembling documents for a nonprofit or serving on the board of the local art museum. If you think you want to take some of those opportunities, by all means do so.
One of John Grisham’s novels, The Street Lawyer I think, mentions large US law firms directing their associates to do a significant amount of pro bono work each year in order that the kudos reflect on the firm. Does this, in fact, happen in the US?
And minty, you rock. Not everyone would wish to take a death penalty case, let alone do it pro bono (and in opposition to your own personal support for the death penalty).
Thank you, reprise. Law firms’ dedication to pro bono varies widely, but the fact of the matter is that free legal work takes billable hours away from the partners’ pockets. Some are more willing to take that hit than others, but nearly all have some institutionalized pro bono programs, even though they may be small.
Minty, I think doing pro bono work is one of the noblest acts anyone can do, even more so by debt-burdened lawyers. How is it you have the time for all you seem to do, I dunno…
It’s always more rewarding to win on the merits rather than simple procedural matters, Anthracite. Nevertheless, given the defendant’s unwillingness to appear, I think I’m going to have to move for a default judgment pretty soon.
And that’s right, Ace, I’m so noble, I’ve got the Queen of England on speed dial. Nah, screw that nobility stuff. I do it because it’s fun and interesting and different. I enjoy being able to offer the assistance, but I’m not Mother Teresa here.
Here’s a chart showing how much pro bono work is done by the largest law firms in Boston. It seems typical for a firm to do between 3% and 5% of its work pro bono. I’d imagine that figures for other cities are comparable.
Just in case anyone is wondering why these phrases seem to pop up when talking about pro bono work. They are further refutation of the assertion that pro bono is a means of advertisment or gathering new clients. If an attorney performs pro bono work outside their field, then the clients, even if they can afford attorney services in the future, wouldn’t come back to that attorney for more work of that type because it’s not his field of practice. Any word-of-mouth recommendations are similarly useless because “I know a guy who handled my divorce and he’s great!” isn’t useful if the lawyer in question normally handles corporate law. So pro bono work doesn’t net the attorney additional(paying) clients for the most part.
This fact also means it’s HARD to do pro bono work. Since you’re working out of your normal area, you have to study cases you’ve never studied before, probably never even thought about studying before. You have to study sections of law you may not have heard of and do a LOT of homework to properly prepare for the time in court. Legal forms you, and your clerks, have never seen before, sending the office go-fers places they’ve never been before, or going yourself, and talking to Judges/officials they’re not familiar with. Pro bono work is extremely costly from the Attorney’s perspective. Even moreso than their regular work. You can’t re-use much of any of your knowledge/arguements/precedents etc. that you use in your regular practice because they aren’t relevant in this suit. Anyone who is even passingly familiar with the amount of preperation that goes into a court case will recognize this as a significant cost to the Attorney.
RexDart I salute you. This country needs good public defenders, and it always will. I wish the salaries were more in line with the rest of the industry. I know a few law students who would have considered PD work, but with the debt levels they incurred during law school they simply can’t afford it. They will HAVE to work for a firm that pays more. If I ever see a resolution come across the local ballot for increasing the salaries of public defenders, I’ll jump on it, even if it means a tax hike. I simply can’t re-inforce how important the work that public defenders do really is. But you already know how important it is, or you wouldn’t be going into it.
Having worked in a large firm well known for its pro bono program, I think there is some truth to this statement. Of course firms like to see their names in the paper for winning an important or visible trial. Firms also use their pro bono practice as a training ground for their new associates. It provides a way for the young people to get into a court room and do real trials etc. So, it isn’t as though the firm is getting nothing for its efforts.
By and large, my experience was that people tended to work just as hard, if not harder, representing the pro bono clients as any other. I worked on a pro bono civil rights trial; it was not a high publicity trial just a Sec. 1983 prisoner’s right case, with a top notch partner. This man’s normal billing rate was well over $400/hr. He put his heart into the case, and we were able to win a 25k verdict. (which is a lot for a jury to give to a prisoner for a civil rights case)
I saw the bills after the trial, and the firm had spent, over the five years it took to take the case to trial, over 300k on the case in billable time. They will never see a drop of that money returned to them. So, anyone who says that pro bono work is a money making activity is a fucking idiot. We should all applaud people like Minty and Rex who are willing to sacrifice for the betterment of others.
Real intelligent attitude, dimwit. Like the legal profession is the only one that has bad apples in it. And the very fact that they are associated with it allows them to automatically be tainted by those who are less than scrupulous.
Yep, no bad doctors out there. No bad businessmen. No bad truck drivers or cops or teachers. Only bad lawyers. What a rotten profession. Minty, and all you other scum-sucking lawyers, you should do us all a favor and kill yourselves right now. How dare you be lawyers? You make me sick, do you hear me? Sick!
Either that or change professions so that you’ll then automatically be a “good guy”.
Well the way they howled, it looked like they had their families all killed , their houses burned down and every other evil thing perpetrated on them. Lots of thin skin around here.
So instead of dealing with the merits of the complaint, you just decided to pop in and opine that the lawyers sure are complaining a lot? My, what a noteworthy contribution–for a gnat.
And the way you howled makes it seems as though lawyers killed your family, burned your house down and perpetrated every other evil thing to ever happen in your life.
45/70, I treated your baseless ranting the way I would treat the baseless ranting of anyone who targeted a specific group (teachers, doctors, police officers, etc) and tarred them all with the same brush.
I am neither pro-lawyer nor am I anti-lawyer. I am, however, someone who tries to judge people on the merits of what they say and how they behave, rather than on what they do for a living.
Based on this thread, you’re on the short end this time.
