Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 An Ambient Bias
- 2 The Theory
- 3 Constitutional Criminal Procedure
- 4 Civil Constitutional Law
- 5 A Short History of Lawyer Regulation
- 6 Current Lawyer Regulation
- 7 Torts
- 8 Evidence and Civil Procedure
- 9 The Business of Law
- 10 Enron's Sole Survivors
- 11 Complexity and the Lawyer–Judge Bias
- 12 Rays of Hope, Ramifications, and Possible Solutions
- Index
- References
7 - Torts
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 May 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 An Ambient Bias
- 2 The Theory
- 3 Constitutional Criminal Procedure
- 4 Civil Constitutional Law
- 5 A Short History of Lawyer Regulation
- 6 Current Lawyer Regulation
- 7 Torts
- 8 Evidence and Civil Procedure
- 9 The Business of Law
- 10 Enron's Sole Survivors
- 11 Complexity and the Lawyer–Judge Bias
- 12 Rays of Hope, Ramifications, and Possible Solutions
- Index
- References
Summary
A defendant attorney owes no duty to the plaintiff. The attorney's paramount duty is to the trial court, as a licensed attorney and officer of the court, and to his client. No cause of action in negligence can lie because the overriding public policy guarding free access to the courts and the fact that the attorney's legal duty is to his own client demands a finding that the attorney owes no duty to an adverse party that would give rise to a claim in negligence, whether to investigate fully the client's claim prior to filing suit or to avoid filing a suit which he knew or should have known was frivolous.
– Clark v. DruckmanTHIS CHAPTER ADDRESSES THE LAW OF TORTS. IT BEGINS with legal malpractice, which is the law that covers clients suing lawyers for harmful, substandard performance. Medical malpractice is used as a comparison point, as the medical and legal professions are somewhat similar, but it is much easier to successfully sue a doctor than it is to successfully sue a lawyer in the United States.
The chapter closes with a discussion of the law of wrongful prosecution – the tort that allows persons who have faced either a baseless criminal prosecution or a civil suit to sue for damages.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Lawyer-Judge Bias in the American Legal System , pp. 161 - 188Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010
References
- 1
- Cited by