Navigation Ethics opinions provide guidance for unaffiliated lawyers sharing offices and resources
The ABA’s Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility released a formal opinion July 12 that provides guidance on how attorneys can share offices and staff resources with an unaffiliated attorney.
In Formal Opinion 507, the ABA opined that office sharing is permissible under the ABA’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct so long as attorneys comply with the “ethical duties concerning the confidentiality of information, conflicts of interest, supervision of nonlawyers and communications about their services.”
The opinion also points out that lawyers who share offices but do not practice together as a law firm must take appropriate steps to clearly communicate the nature of their relationship to the public and to their clients and cites the model rule regarding advertising as prohibiting any “false or misleading communication about the lawyer or the lawyer’s services.” For instance, the lawyers “may not imply or hold themselves out as practicing together in one firm when they are not a firm.”
