BY ANDREW F. HALABY
Background
The Arizona Rules of Professional Conduct contain
a number of provisions
under which an ethical
screen can be erected in
order to resolve an otherwise disqualifying problem. 3 The scenarios include private lawyers moving from one law firm to
another (ER 1. 10), government lawyers moving
to private practice (ER
1. 11), adjudicative personnel and neutrals moving
to private practice (ER
1. 12), and lawyers having
received confidential information from prospective
clients (ER 1. 18). Non-lawyer assistants can be
screened as well. 4
This article addresses
private lateral screening
under ER 1. 10. To ease
the discussion, consider
our base case as involving
a lawyer (“Lawyer”) who
wants to move from current firm (“Firm C”) to
target firm (“Firm T”).
The problem is that Firm
C and Firm T oppose one
another in a legal matter
Arizona’s Private Lateral
Screening Rule:
Dramatic Improvement
The Arizona judicial department1 has a strong history and culture of experimentation. In
2003, Arizona adopted a private lateral screening rule that ultimately proved unworkable in
practice. On August 27, 2015, in an order on the State Bar’s Rule Change Petition R-13-
0046, the Arizona Supreme Court changed it. Effective January 1, 2016, an ethics rule
whose application once was referred to in this magazine as “rocket science” 2 has become
simpler and more predictable. As a result, large numbers of Arizona lawyers have greater
assurance as to whether a prospective job change will knock their putative new employer
out of a current representation, and corresponding greater certainty as to whether they can
safely explore such a job change. This is all to the good.
