If a client discloses an intent to commit suicide, a lawyer’s first obligations should be the same as any sensitive and understanding individual. “The client’s disclosure may be a cry for attention or help, and the lawyer should make a special effort to give the client sympathetic counseling.” New York Ethics Opinion 486. The lawyer should show appropriate concern, encourage the client to seek help, and the lawyer may counsel the client against suicide. See id; e.g., Connecticut Ethics Opinion 04-10.

Rule 4-1.6 (a), Rules Regulating The Florida Bar, requires a lawyer to keep confidential all information relating to a representation, including a client’s intent to commit suicide, but the rule permits a lawyer to reveal information if the client consents after consultation. The lawyer is advised to consult with the client and if appropriate to ask for consent to disclose the client’s intent. Connecticut Ethics Opinion 49. During the consultation, the lawyer may recommend the client seek the services of a mental health professional or advise the client to call his or her own doctor, a local mental health clinic, or a crisis hotline. Alaska Ethics Opinion 2005-1. The lawyer may also recommend the client call a friend or relative who could help in arranging for appropriate intervention or care. Where possible, the lawyer should encourage and assist the client to seek needed help. This obligation is especially strong where it appears that the client may not be mentally capable of making rational decisions. New York Ethics Opinion 486 n.1.

A client who threatens suicide presents a lawyer with a difficult dilemma in trying “to balance the law’s longstanding policies concerning the protection of human life against customary professional standards involving the preservation of client confidences and secrets.” The lawyer may, and generally should, take appropriate action to keep the client from committing suicide, and for this purpose, the lawyer may be required to reveal the client’s suicidal intent to others. If the client does not consent to the disclosure after consultation, or it is either impossible or inadvisable to consult with the client about disclosure, the question becomes whether the Rules of Professional Conduct mandate or permit disclosure without the client’s consent. Connecticut Ethics Opinion 49.