Recent events have found a government whistleblower at the center of a controversy involving the potential impeachment of a president. Forty-five years ago, John Dean, President Nixon’s White House Counsel, became the most prominent lawyer whistleblower in American history. His testimony resulted in the only resignation of a sitting U. S. president and started a revolution in legal ethics. See ABA Journal, “The Lawyers of Watergate: How a ‘3rd-Rate Burglary’ Provoked New Standards for Lawyer Ethics,” June 1, 2012.
Since Watergate, federal law has changed under the False Claims Act, Sarbanes-Oxley, Dodd-Frank, IRS Whistleblower programs, and the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act, among others. Questions arise as to a lawyer’s role as a whistleblower, given a lawyer’s duty of confidentiality and duty of loyalty. A good number of law review articles have expounded on the question.
Whether a lawyer may “report out” on a client is a complicated and fraught question. If done incorrectly, the lawyers risks discipline or even loss of the license to practice. This seminar is meant to provide the historical context to the question of when lawyers can—or must—report ongoing or future crime or fraud.

Law students can register for free by emailing Lisa Henrichs at lhenrichs@nebar.com.