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Paying Witnesses' Attorneys

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2022

Publication Title

ABA Criminal Justice

Abstract

Former President Donald Trump’s Save America PAC and Make America Great Again PAC have paid over $2.2 million this year to law firms representing Trump allies targeted by the committee investigating the January 6 insurrection at the capital. In addition, more than a dozen witnesses have had their attorney fees paid for by the American Conservative Union’s 'First Amendment Fund', which consults with Trump’s team about whose attorney fees to pay. January 6 Committee members are concerned that these attorneys may coerce some of these witnesses. Representative Zoe Lofgren said of the Trump PACs’ payment of attorney fees: 'it’s not clear that the arrangement is one that is without coercion, potentially, for some of those witnesses'. Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson fired the lawyer recommended by former Trump aides and paid for by his PAC prior to her candid and compelling testimony before the January 6 Committee, a decision that strongly supports the validity of this concern. Hutchinson told the Committee that people close to Trump suggested she would be better off 'staying loyal' to Trump. It is not illegal for a third party to pay another person’s attorney fees and not unethical for a lawyer to accept such payment. But such an arrangement gives rise to a number of serious, well-recognized ethical issues. When are such payments unethical? How might they undermine execution of the lawyer’s duties to the client? How significant is the risk of such compromising? Do such payments create a conflict of interest between the client and the attorney? When do such payments impermissibly interfere with the client’s authority to make decisions about the case? In this paper, we explore these issues.

Keywords

Legal Ethics, Professional Responsibility, Trump, Witnesses

Publication Citation

Peter A. Joy & Kevin C. McMunigal, Paying Witnesses' Attorneys, 37 ABA Criminal Justice 52 (2022)

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