Sitch:
John and Sally are married with two kids in Texas, but are in the very early stages of getting divorced. Sally, unbeknownst to the husband, has records of texts showing a high likelihood of adultery (or at the very least, planned adultery) which she gives to her lawyer. When everyone comes together for the first time–John, his lawyer, Sally, her lawyer–and John’s lawyer sees these records, he tells John he can no longer represent him.
Why?
John’s lawyer has a professional or personal relationship with the person John has been texting?
Or, perhaps, John’s lawyer is himself John’s lover.
This sounds to me like a variant of the old “surgeon’s son” riddle, except with the gender assumption replaced by a sexuality assumption.
It’s not a riddle, it’s a real question.
I’d be interested in knowing if a personal relationship with John’s (potential) partner would make his representing John an ethics violation. I could see that if Sally’s lawyer had such a relationship it would be a problem.
Is this a hypothetical? If it is, it doesn’t have a factual answer.
If it’s concrete, you haven’t provided enough information for a factual answer; speculations towards a factual answer are the best you can expect.
If it’s a real question, then we need to know what was in the texts.
Absent that, either you’re giving us a riddle, or you’re asking for speculation.
The potential partner is in Pennsylvania, so that probably isn’t it.
This is a real-life situation involving my sister and brother in-law (my wife’s sister is the wife). Names were changed.
My guesses:
The lawyer previously asked John if he’d been unfaithful, and John said he hadn’t. Then when John’s lawyer sees good evidence that his client has been dishonest, he says ‘forget it, buddy’.
Or, similarly,
The lawyer sees that he’s taken on a loser (or at least a rough uphill battle) and decides to bow out.
But I don’t know if lawyers can do things like that.
The texts are to another woman and apparently make it obvious he was setting up a liason, and that there has been ongoing emotional infidelity, at least.
Of course I’m asking for speculation, reasoned speculation. The only way I could get at the answer for sure is to corner John and/or his lawyer down in Texas and ask them what happened.
John’s lawyer learns from the texts that the woman John is is having an affair with is his (the lawyer’s) wife?
IANAL, OK? But no, lawyers can’t do that. They absolutely cannot drop a client just because they think it will be a tough case. AFAIK, they can’t even drop a client because the client isn’t paying the bills, at least not for quite a while.
And I don’t think a matrimonial lawyer is going to be thrown much by the discovery that his client has been unfaithful. I don’t think the lawyer would even ask.
Out of curiosity, how did Sally get a record of the texts?
(IANAL, so I can’t answer your questions, sorry)
Here’s reasoned speculation: the attorney doesn’t need any reason to not accept a client, or to ‘fire’ a potential client. Like you said, it’s the first meeting.
He just doesn’t like how it feels. That’s all he needs. It’s a free country. He likes Sally and doesn’t like John.
Some sort of jointly-shared cloud storage thingaroo with their provider.
Unclear. It’s the first meeting of all together, but that doesn’t mean it’s the first meeting of the lawyer with John. Once he agreed to take on the case, I don’t think it’s so easy to just drop it because he doesn’t “like” John or the situation, but IANA lawyer.
Moderator Action
Since you are asking for speculation, and this seems to involve legal issues and opinions, let’s move it to our legal opinion and speculation forum.
Moving thread from General Questions to In My Humble Opinion.
If I parsed it out right, John’s attorney will not represent him when he appears to be an adulterer. Could it be the lawyer is a self-professed good Christian that refuses to have business dealing with sinners, kind of like “good Christians” that will not associate with homosexuals?
If John had lied to the lawyer previously (“Nope! Never been unfaithful!”), could the lawyer drop him when the lawyer discovered the truth?
Or, could a lawyer have a “No Adulterers” policy, and drop the client when the lawyer discovered the adultery? Not that it would be good business, but maybe the lawyer has a personal moral objection to representing adulterers?
ETA: yeah, what Saint Cad said.
Possible I guess; it is Texas.
Why can’t the lawyer disengage himself from someone who did not act in good faith?