New Hampshire’s Supreme Court Committee on Professional Conduct accused the respondent of violating New Hampshire Rule of Professional Conduct 7.1, which provides that a lawyer is prohibited from making a “false or misleading communication about the lawyer or the lawyer’s services.” Under the rule, a communication is false or misleading if it “contains a material misrepresentation of fact or law.”
The website for the respondent’s law firm “suggested that he had experience in helping small businesses file direct public offerings, although [he] had only drafted offerings that had never been filed.” The referee appointed to the case determined that the language on the website “advertised [the respondent’s] expertise in financing and raising capital even though ‘he did not have any special training or experience in securities law.'” The referee determined that such statement was a violation of Rule 7.1, and the state’s Supreme Court affirmed the decision.
Richmond’s Case, — A.2d —, 2005 WL 1048105 (N.H., May 6, 2005).
November 5, 2010
Judges and attorneys are doing far worse things than bending the truth in their advertising. I wish this was the worst that goes on but its not. The really bad stuff done by self-important and arrogant people never even gets noticed.