Responding to Online Reviews - Ethically - and Other Risky Online Activities

Wendy J. Muchman joined the law school faculty in 2014 as a Lecturer. She was formerly an Adjunct Professor of Legal Ethics at Northwestern from 2000 to 2014 and has taught Legal Ethics courses at other Chicago law schools.

Professor Muchman currently is the Chief of Litigation and Professional Education at the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission of the Supreme Court of Illinois. She investigates and prosecutes lawyer disciplinary cases, including In re Rinella, 175 Ill.2d 504, 677 N.E.2d 909 (1997). Her job responsibilities also include supervision and training of all litigation attorneys and staff at the ARDC. She regularly lectures and presents workshops regarding professional responsibility and disciplinary law to various bar association groups, law firms, judges and law schools.

Professor Muchman serves as a faculty member for the National Institute for Trial Advocacy (NITA) for the regional and national trial advocacy, deposition and National Organization of Bar Counsel programs. She serves as an assistant team leader for the NITA Trial Advocacy Midwest Regional Program. In 2013, she was selected to participate as a fellow in the National Institute for Teaching Ethics and Professional Responsibilty. In 2012, she was elected member-at-large to the Council of the American Bar Association Government and Public Lawyers Division where she stills serves. Between 2009 and 2011, she served as the Vice-Chair, then Chair, of the Chicago Bar Association Committee on Professional Responsibility. Prior to 1989 when she started her employment at the Commission, Professor Muchman litigated in the state and federal courts. Areas of practice included insurance litigation, civil rights, age discrimination and aviation defense work.

Professor Muchman received her JD from DePaul University College of Law and her BA from the University of Illinois, Champaign/Urbana.

Lynda opened The Shely Firm, PC in 2003 after serving as the State Bar of Arizona’s Director of Lawyer Ethics for ten years. Lynda represents legal professionals, including law firms, in-house corporate legal departments, individual lawyers and government entities in ethics, risk management, and professional responsibility matters.

Lynda advises lawyers in responding to Bar inquiries, serves as a practice monitor for lawyers in discipline diversion programs, consults with firms on ethics compliance including staff training, law rm practice management procedures (calendaring, conflict checking, client intake procedures, communication policies, fee agreement requirements, record retention policies, and risk assessment), trust account reviews, and she reviews lawyer advertising and marketing for ethics compliance. Lynda also provides in-house CLE ethics programs customized to each rm.

Lynda also serves as an expert witness in legal malpractice cases, fee disputes, motions to disqualify, and unauthorized practice of law claims. Lynda has been qualified as an expert in Arizona legal ethics.

Lynda is a frequent national speaker on all legal ethics, risk management, professional liability, billing, unauthorized practice of law, legal marketing, social media and technology ethics issues, and professionalism topics.

As the Director of Ethics at the State Bar of Arizona from 1993 until 2003, Lynda answered approximately 8000 ethics calls each year and drafted dozens of written ethics advisory opinions published by the State Bar Ethics Committee. She also supervised the unauthorized practice of law counsel, the Fee Arbitration Program, and Peer Review Committee. She served as staff counsel to the Client Protection Fund and Ethics Committee. Lynda began her legal career in 1987 as an intellectual property associate at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius in Washington, D.C.

As a member of the State Bar of Arizona’s Ethical Rules Review Group and Multijurisdictional Task Force, Lynda helped with the drafting of both the 2003 extensive amendments to the Arizona Rules of Professional Conduct as well as the amendments to Ethical Rule 5.5 to permit temporary practice in Arizona by out-of-state lawyers.

Lynda currently serves on the State Bar of Arizona Convention Working Group, the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, the ABA Working Group on the Advancement of Lawyer WellBeing, and as a member of the ABA House of Delegates.

Lynda is a past president of the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers (APRL), which is the national association of lawyers who advise and represent other lawyers on legal ethics, discipline and malpractice matters. Lynda also is a past president of the Scottsdale Bar Association.

Elizabeth Clark Tarbert has been Ethics Counsel for The Florida Bar since 1997, providing oral and written ethics opinions to members of The Florida Bar and advising the Professional Ethics Committee, Standing Committee on Advertising, and Board Review Committee on Professional Ethics. She has also served as counsel to numerous special bar committees such as the Special Committee on Multidisciplinary Practice, Ancillary Business Special Committee, Special Committee to Review the ABA Model Rules 2002, and several ad-vertising task forces.

Before becoming Ethics Counsel, she served as Assistant Ethics Counsel from 1994 to 1995, she has been an Assistant Public Defender in both Dallas, Texas and with the Eighth Judicial Circuit in Gainesville, Florida. While at the Defense Contract Management District Mid-Atlantic, Defense Logistics Agency in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Ms. Tarbert worked in a special fraud remedies unit, assisting in the investigation and prosecution of government contractors.

Ms. Tarbert graduated from the University of Florida College of Law with honors and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from the University of Florida. She frequently speaks on legal ethics and professional responsibility.