New York Times – January 24, 2007, via Overlawyered.com:
What: Insurance agent sued for “unauthorized practice of law” after he uses Quicken software to help a 91-year-old woman create a will.
When: Supreme Court of South Carolina rules on January 22.
Outcome: Use of computer software ruled to be “unauthorized practice of law.”
What happened, according to court documents:
Ernest Chavis is a South Carolina insurance agent who previously had some business dealings with a 91-year-old woman named Annie Belle Weiss. On July 20, 2004, Chavis visited her and, at some point in the conversation, Weiss asked him “Can you help me make a will?”Weiss said she was asking because she wanted “someone objective” and told Chavis how she wanted her property divided up. Chavis used Quicken software–apparently Quicken WillMaker or Quicken Family Lawyer–to fill in the blanks and then brought the completed will to her in the hospital. Weiss signed it on July 31, 2004, and died two months later.
Beth Franklin and Julianne Franklin, Weiss’ grandnieces, filed a lawsuit contesting her will and claiming Chavis engaged in the unauthorized practice of law. Chavis was named as Weiss’ personal representative, but not as a beneficiary. (He would be, however, entitled to up to 5 percent of the estate’s value under state law because of his duties as personal representative.)
In this case, too, the Supreme Court of South Carolina took an expansive view of unauthorized-practice-of-law violations. Instead of acting as a mere “scrivener” or stenographer, the court said that Chavis did the work away from the hospital outside of Weiss’s presence and was guilty of an unauthorized-practice-of-law violation.
So, let me get this straight:
A professional lawyer (judge) ruled against a non-lawyer in an issue involving the practice of law? Who could have seen that one coming?
The wishes of the deceased are not being carried out because of a “technicallity”. The law (or the deceased) has not been served in this case, it was the f—ing lawyers that have been served in this case.
1,
If it weren’t for the f*cking grandnieces, there would be no f*cking lawyers involved.
People are always first to blame lawyers yet the lawyers couldn’t act without a plaintiff.
#1 – Some ungrateful bitch didn’t get a slice of Granny Pie and (as is her right) hired a lawyer to sue the guy that helped Granny make the will. So obviously, the lawyers are at fault because you didn’t like the outcome?
HOLY FREAKING CRAP – I just noticed that it was grandNIECES and not grandDAUGHTERS…
How freaking petulant.
She knew he was not a lawyer, and she still asked for his advice – that is all that should matter in this case. But, the informed consent of adults can never be allowed to trump the desire of trade associations to use the law to protect their business interests.
I’m surprised people aren’t being fined for illegally practicing medicine because they gave somebody with a headache a Tylenol.
Reasonable people defending lawyers? Is this Bizarro-World?
While I agree the plaintiffs are worse, I’d say the lawyers are at least partially responsible because they took the case. Of course there are degrees of under-handedness, but no one is smelling like roses in this case.
In this particular case, I’d say that the grandnieces are the primary culprits of wrongdoing. They actions appear to have been entirely greed-motivated. On a larger scale it is many people’s fault: lawyers who have set the precedents that allow ridiculous crap like this to occur and people who abuse the system to bleed money out of anyone they can. Not all lawyers and not all people are like this, but those who use courts as market rather than a judicial system are the root causes of this kind of bullshit.
Happiness? From the article: “The judges did refuse to throw out the will in response to the grandnieces’ requests, concluding ‘if the July 31 will was in fact drafted pursuant to Ms. Weiss’s true wishes, it should not be invalidated simply because it was drafted by a non-lawyer.'”
So they’ve fidgeted themselves into saying that a non-lawyer my carry out legal tasks no greater than that of being a “mere scrivener,” since an incompetent lawyer is a menace to society much as would be an incompetent surgeon. Not sure what I believe, but I’m certain that some cases have taken it too far and have resulted in a chilling effect on the usefulness of conversations with people who see this stuff every day at the courthouse…
#5 nailed it. What’s more pernicious than a trade association passing laws to protect their interest, in spite of the common good? A trade association whose business is the law itself – lawyers.
This guy should consider himself lucky for not sharing a copy of the software with someone else, lest the copyright SWAT team raid his house. The Bourgeoisie better be careful, they’re inching this country ever so closer to the “revolution” threshold of the proletariat.
I wonder how Quicken comes out on this. If a person can be sued for using their software can they be? I would think they might want to let this guy use their lawyers.
#11, very good point. If this is allowed to stand then every company that makes software or publishes books that intrude into law, medicine, and even accounting fields may end up being charged with practicing without a license.
Quicken might be smart to challenge this with their own lawyers.
#12. indeed. couldn’t it be said the software, by telling the user which forms to use, is giving them legal advice? I would be bet that the paragraphs of fine print that come with TurboWill or whatever admonish the user to not draft wills on behalf of anyone else. nothing illegal about writing your own lawyer.
lawyers are big on protecting the monopoly. hereabouts, each side involved in the sale of a home has to have a lawyer to deal with the – largely boilerplate – contracts. adds about $500 to the costs for each side, to no good end. doctors work the same way, just ask any midwife.
and for all those who want to blame lawyers for taking cases that they don’t agree with – if your side succeeds, the case is by definition, not frivolous. and your first obligation as a lawyer is to your client, not to public opinion.
I bought a set of plans or drawings for a play house from Norm of TV fame.
I built the thing. Can I be sued for “carpentry without an Architect ?
Just to add another thought, I wonder if this might be a restriction of free speech. This could actually cross the line into what may be written or published if that advice can not be used. The court is saying you can speak, but we can regulate your audience.