Since the adoption of the Rules of Professional Conduct by the Tennessee Supreme Court, effective March, 2003, some new Formal Ethics Opinions have been issued by the Ethics Committee of the Board of Professional Responsibility. One such opinion addresses the applicability of Rule of Professional Conduct 1.10 (Imputed Disqualification) to non-lawyer staff of law firms, due to the fact that Rule 1.10 and the prior Code of Professional Responsibility does not mention non-lawyers in the Rule of Imputed Disqualification.

This formal opinion affirms the concepts of the prior Formal Ethics Opinion 89-F-118 (1989) and expands the reasoning based on Rule of Professional Conduct 5.3 which provides that lawyers must insure that conduct of their non-lawyer personnel remains “compatible with these Rules.”

The entire Formal Ethics Opinion 2003-F-147