When a lawyer leaves a firm and takes her client files with her, her former firm is not absolved of its duties to that former client. That’s the upshot of a recent appellate court ruling.
In In Re Lubrication Systems Company of Texas (LCS), the 1st Court of Appeals declined to overturn a trial court ruling disqualifying Baker Botts from representing a plaintiff in a trade secrets dispute. The trial court disqualified the firm because one of its former lawyers had an attorney-client relationship with the defendant in the trade secrets case.
