The Georgia Supreme Court this week pondered an issue of first impression: whether a paralegal who works on a case then switches to the other side’s firm automatically disqualifies her new employer from the litigation.
At issue is whether firms can use a so-called ethical screen to wall off a nonlawyer from the firm’s work on a case in order to prevent the nonlawyer’s conflict of interest from disqualifying others at the firm. The Supreme Court last year issued an opinion in another case that appeared to leave open questions about firms using ethical screens to avoid imputation of lawyer conflicts. The state’s lawyer ethics rules don’t specifically address how to handle conflicts of law firm employees who are not attorneys.
