Detroit attorney Carl Collins III has paid a $5,000 fine for chasing victims in the wake of the February 2009 crash of Continental/Colgan Flight 3407 near Buffalo, according to The Detroit News. According to the US Attorney's Office he sent letters out to victims' families 12 days after the crash, in violation of federal law that bans solicitations within 45 days of air disasters. This is the second such settlement regarding the crash, with New Jersey attorney Richard Weiner having likewise been fined $5,000 for chasing clients with letters.

Both of these actions came from federal authorities. New York has its own 30-day anti-solicitation rule (for all mass disasters), which applies to out-of-state attorneys as well. New York has thus far been silent on the issue of whether anyone has been pursued for violations.

The chasing was a big topic for me early in the year, as I tracked a string of law firms that started to electronically chase clients by running Google Adwords, before pulling the ads after they were exposed. You can read those posts at this tag: Buffalo Air Crash. This air crash was the first true test of New York's 30-day rule that went into effect in February 2007. The 30-day rule was not affected when other parts of the new rules were tossed out by a federal judge in July 2007.

Some of those ads had been run through various marketers, with the effect that lawyers had outsourced their ethics along with their marketing. I had discussed the concept of such ethics laundering to beat New York's 30-day anti-solicitation rule a year ago.

As of today, I am not aware of any attorney having yet been sanctioned for such e-chasing (which I covered two years ago in Attorney Solicitation 2.0 - Is It Ethical?) but that day is surely coming.

My thanks to Buffalo attorney Roy Mura, of Coverage Counsel fame, for passing on the Detroit News story.

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

The February 12th crash of Continental Flight 3407 and the law firms that appeared to have violated New York and federal ethics rules have previously been chronicled here (see posts below).

But now there seems to be a new entrant: The 50+ lawyer San Francisco based firm of Leiff Cabraser is now running ads via Google that appear under the search "Buffalo Plane Crash." The ad looks like this:

Buffalo NY Plane Crash
Aviation law answers from
leading, national law firm.
www.LieffCabraser.com

A pdf of the search result is here: /BuffaloPlaneCrashSearch3-17.pdf
Clicking the ad this afternoon brings up this page of the Lieff Cabraser site pitching their services:/LeiffCabraserSite.pdf

While New York's 30-day solicitation rule has run its course, the federal 45 day rule has not. As per 49 U.S.C. 1136 (G)(2):

(2) Unsolicited communications.-- In the event of an accident involving an air carrier providing interstate or foreign air transportation and in the event of an accident involving a foreign air carrier that occurs within the United States, no unsolicited communication concerning a potential action for personal injury or wrongful death may be made by an attorney (including any associate, agent, employee, or other representative of an attorney) or any potential party to the litigation to an individual injured in the accident, or to a relative of an individual involved in the accident, before the 45th day following the date of the accident.

I assume that, if push came to shove, the firm would try to claim that running advertisements does not meet the definition of solicitation set forth above.

Previously at my site on the ethics of internet solicitation by attorneys:

• New Attorney Advertising Rules (Is This Blog an Advertisement?) (1/5/07)
  

• Who, Exactly, Must Comply With New York's Attorney Advertising Rules? (2/2/07)

• NY Advertising Rules Found Unconstitutional By Federal Judge (7/23/07)

• Attorney Solicitation 2.0 --- Is It Ethical? (12/7/07)

• "Metrolink Train Attoneys" Appear (And What If It Happened in New York?) (9/22/08)

• Hudson River Plane Crash To Test New York's New Attorney Ethics Rules? (1/15/09)

• We Have A Winner! (Lawyer Soliciting Airline Victim Department) (1/16/09)

• New York's Anti-Solicitation Rule Allows For Ethics Laundering and Must Be Modified (1/22/09)
  

• Buffalo Plane Crash WILL Test New York's New Anti-Solicitation Rules (2/13/09)

• Buffalo Plane Crash Ad Taken Down (2/13/09)

• Flight 3407 (Buffalo Crash) Web Site Established By Law Firm (Contravening Ethics Rules?) (2/16/09)
  

• DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients (2/17/09)

• Ribbeck Firm of Chicago Still Soliciting Buffalo Plane Crash Victims? (And A Round-Up) (2/23/09)

• Do Attorney Anti-Solicitation Rules Work? (A Brief Analysis of Three Disasters) (2/26/09)

Photo credit: Jordan Husney (via Flickr)

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

The ads are gone. All of them. In the wake of the crash of Continental 3407 near Buffalo I tracked seven different law firms using Google Adwords to advertise for victims, and every ad has now disappeared. (Search terms used: "Continental 3407" and "Buffalo Plane Crash.")

(Update at 5:18 pm on 2/26, a search for "Continental 3407" once again brings up an ad by the Washington DC firm of Clapp, Desjardins & Ely. I wrote about them last week in DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients.)

So here is a quick and dirty analysis as to whether or not attorney anti-solicitation rules were the reason, based on three recent disasters.

First: On October 15, 2003 the Staten Island Ferry crashed killing 11 people and injuring 71. In the following days the Staten Island Advance was flooded with lawyer ads. This was the impetus for New York's 30-day anti-solicitation rule, which went into effect at the beginning of 2007. (I tried to get back issues to actually count the ads, but they were not available.)

Second: On September 28, 2008, a Metrolink train crashed in Chatsworth, CA, near Los Angeles, that killed 25 and injured over 100 more. Kevin O'Keefe counted at least 25 sponsored ads by attorneys when he ran a Google search for "Los Angeles Train Accident Attorney." California does not have an attorney anti-solicitation rule.

Third: The crash near Buffalo had only seven ads, and most (as detailed in the links below) were from out of state.

While this isn't the most scientific of experiments, the sharp contrast leaves little doubt that ethics rules are effective in putting a sharp brake on attorney solicitation (or at least this public type of solicitation). Bearing in mind that there are about a million lawyers in the nation and about 75,000 in New York, the restraint shown has been extraordinary. Only a very few people attempted it, and they quickly withdrew.

Whether the rules survive First Amendment challenge due to the difficulty defining solicitation given the myriad ways it can be done under cover of writing about an incident on a website or blog, as I've previously discussed, is another story.

These rules exist in eight states (as of July, 2007) plus a federal rule specific to aviation disasters. The only judge to review the rules so far, Judge Frederick Scullin, Jr. sitting in the Northern District of New York in Alexander v. Cahill, wrote in a footnote about the reason for the rules:

Without question there has been a proliferation of tasteless, and at times obnoxious, methods of attorney advertising in recent years. New technology and an increase in the types of media available for advertising have exacerbated this problem and made it more ubiquitous. As a result, among other things, the public perception of the legal profession has been greatly diminished.

That decision has been appealed and was recently argued in the Second Circuit.

Prior posts on this subject:

• New Attorney Advertising Rules (Is This Blog an Advertisement?) (1/5/07)
  

• Who, Exactly, Must Comply With New York's Attorney Advertising Rules? (2/2/07)

• NY Advertising Rules Found Unconstitutional By Federal Judge (7/23/07)

• Attorney Solicitation 2.0 --- Is It Ethical? (12/7/07)

• "Metrolink Train Attoneys" Appear (And What If It Happened in New York?) (9/22/08)

• Hudson River Plane Crash To Test New York's New Attorney Ethics Rules? (1/15/09)

• We Have A Winner! (Lawyer Soliciting Airline Victim Department) (1/16/09)

• New York's Anti-Solicitation Rule Allows For Ethics Laundering and Must Be Modified (1/22/09)
  

• Buffalo Plane Crash WILL Test New York's New Anti-Solicitation Rules (2/13/09)

• Buffalo Plane Crash Ad Taken Down (2/13/09)

• Flight 3407 (Buffalo Crash) Web Site Established By Law Firm (Contravening Ethics Rules?) (2/16/09)
  

• DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients (2/17/09)

• Ribbeck Firm of Chicago Still Soliciting Buffalo Plane Crash Victims? (And A Round-Up) (2/23/09)
  

Photo credit: Jordan Husney (via Flickr)

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

I was all set this morning to write that the lawyers I found last week running Google ads regarding the crash of Continental Flight 3407 near Buffalo had all been pulled down. There were seven law firms involved: Three from Chicago, two from Philadelphia, and one each from Houston and New York. I had done a Google search while on vacation in Florida on Saturday and, when I found none, asked Scott Greenfield to run one in New York in case there was some regional difference in the Google algorithms. He also found all the ads gone.

But as I sat down to type this morning I did one last search and, lo and behold, a search of "Flight 3407" finds that the Ribbeck Law Firm of Chicago has an ad again, and they seem to determined to make themselves a test case of New York's 30-day anti-solicitation rule. This is the firm that built a site specifically for this crash, www.Continental3407.us.

It's worth noting that the web site has now been modified. This come-on previously appeared on the site after expressions of sympathy:

Please feel free to contact us at 1 312 xxx-xxxx or 1 312 xxx-xxxx should you
have any questions. You can also send an e-mail to Monica Kelly(aviation
law) at monicakelly@ribbecklaw.com.
Operator Colgan Air, as
Continental Connection

The modified site no longer screams at people to call them, but expresses condolences and tells people how to contact them in more subtle ways. You can see the old version here and the new version here: /RibbeckFirm34072%3A27@6-32.pdf

Thus, in modifying the site, the firm apparently seems to believe that they stepped over the ethics line with a flagrant solicitation, in violation of New York's 30 day anti-solicitation rule and the 45-day federal anti-solicitation rule (depending on the fed definition).

But the firm may also likewise believe that running a Google ad designed to appear for a "Flight 3407" search inquiry with the overt part of the solicitation now removed, will somehow save them from the ethics rules.

The un-tested ethics rules would seem to say otherwise. Ribbeck seems to fail on all four prongs of New York's definition of solicitation. Note in particular the very troublesome section "b." It is troublesome due to the difficulty sometimes in defining "the primary purpose" of a communication. According to Ethical Consideration (EC) 2-18 of New York's Code of Professional Responsibility:

A "solicitation" means any advertisement:
a) which is initiated by a lawyer or law firm (as opposed to a communication made in response to an inquiry initiated by a potential client);
b) with a primary purpose of persuading recipients to retain the lawyer or law firm (as opposed to providing educational information about the law) (see EC 2-6(c));
c) which has as a significant motive for the lawyer to make money (as opposed to a public interest lawyer offering pro bono services); and
d) which is directed to or targeted at a specific recipient or group of recipients, or their family members or legal representatives. (emphasis added)

Since Ribbeck had flat-out asked people to call when they set this web site up, though, they will be hard pressed to claim that solicitation of victim's families was not the primary purpose.

Other posts I've made on this subject, dating back to the start of this blog and continuing through with the splash landing in the Hudson of Continental Flight 1549 until the present:

• New Attorney Advertising Rules (Is This Blog an Advertisement?) (1/5/07)
  

• Who, Exactly, Must Comply With New York's Attorney Advertising Rules? (2/2/07)

• NY Advertising Rules Found Unconstitutional By Federal Judge (7/23/07)

• Attorney Solicitation 2.0 --- Is It Ethical? (12/7/07)

• "Metrolink Train Attoneys" Appear (And What If It Happened in New York?) (9/22/08)

• Hudson River Plane Crash To Test New York's New Attorney Ethics Rules? (1/15/09)

• We Have A Winner! (Lawyer Soliciting Airline Victim Department) (1/16/09)

• New York's Anti-Solicitation Rule Allows For Ethics Laundering and Must Be Modified (1/22/09)
  

• Buffalo Plane Crash WILL Test New York's New Anti-Solicitation Rules (2/13/09)

• Buffalo Plane Crash Ad Taken Down (2/13/09)

• Flight 3407 (Buffalo Crash) Web Site Established By Law Firm (Contravening Ethics Rules?) (2/16/09)
  

• DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients (2/17/09)

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

Query: How hungry does a law firm have to be to run the risk that their client acquisition tactics will put them in ethical hot water?

Shortly after the crash of Continental Flight 3407 near Buffalo, I wrote that the crash would test New York's new 30-day anti-solicitation ethics rules. I did a few searches to establish a baseline and chronicled the development of the marketing. The marketing takes several different forms, as I noted after the US Airways splash landing, and includes how attorney ethics can be laundered. I also wrote that some of techniques might afoul of the First Amendment and needed to be modified. The Second Circuit currently has one case on the subject.

And so yesterday I ran a new post on those firms that have started marketing, one with a brand new website and others with Google ads directing people to the firm's existing site (Flight 3407 (Buffalo Crash) Web Site Established By Law Firm (Contravening Ethics Rules?)). Three firms from Chicago and one from Houston were found to be apparently soliciting in this fashion, as well as one from New York.

Today comes another (hat tip to Patrick from Popehat). If you Google "Flight 3407" you get this ad in the sidebar:

CDE - Aviation Lawyers
Experienced aviation accident and
transportation injury lawyers
cdelaw.net

So once again we see a firm, this time Clapp, Desjardins & Ely of Washington D.C., apparently using keywords to trigger the ad placement while avoiding a direct reference to the flight in the ad. But the page it brings you to is unambiguous, with this invitation on the home page:

Click for information on the Crash of Continental Express flight 3407.

After clicking the ad, I headed to the new page where, after expressing their sympathies, the lawyers write (/ClappWebSite2%3A17@12-23pm.pdf):

We are willing to meet with any family affected by this tragedy. Should you wish to set up a meeting, either in person or via a conference call to discuss your legal needs concerning the Continental Express Flight 3407 crash, please call Mike Ely or Doug Desjardins at 202-xxx-xxxx.

In the old days, solicitation took place with direct contact by mail or in person. Then New York altered its ethics rules to include cyber-solicitation, and that also applies to solicitation from from out-of-state law firms. You can read about it at this prior post.

There is also, as I noted yesterday (as had a couple of commenters) a federal prohibition against solicitation.

So it appears that the firms jumping into the advertising game are willing to take the risk of action against their licenses in exchange for acquiring new cases.

I have no doubt that if New York or the feds open ethics investigations, there will be these defenses:

First: Somehow claim that the ad wasn't a solicitation to victims's families; and

Second: Even if it is, it is protected by the First Amendment; and

Third: That they weren't responsible for the ad placement, but that a marketer did it without their knowledge. Turning a blind eye to what is being done in the name of the law firm will no doubt occur.

But as I noted yesterday, when ethics is tied to marketing, and you outsource your marketing, then you have also outsourced your ethics.
---------------------------------------------------
Updated: The Philadelphia firm of Messa & Associates has jumped into the cyber-solicitation chase. See the first comment.

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

A new website has been established by a Chicago law firm to solicit the family members of the crash near Buffalo New York last week. It is the Ribbeck Law Firm, founded by Manuel von Ribbeck. This is the web site's home page (www.continental3407.us/index.htm) with a snapshot of the page at about 1:50 pm today: /Flight3407WebSite.pdf Other lawyers have been found to be using Google Adwords to solicit readers to their websites with the search term "Flight 3407," while keeping that search term out of the ad itself.

(I had previously discussed how this air disaster would test New York's new 30-day anti-solicitation rules.)

The lawyers at Ribbeck express sympathy for the victims at their new site, and then invite relatives to contact them with this come-on from partner Monica Kelly:

Please feel free to contact us at 1 312 822 9999 or 1 312 608 6776 should you have any questions. You can also send an e-mail to Monica Kelly (aviation law) at monicakelly@ribbecklaw.com.

You can find the ad when you Google Flight 3407 (/Flight3407GoogleSearch.pdf), and you will also find another Chicago firm popping up, The Nolan Law Group. The Google ad link for Nolan brings up this following image as of 1:56 p.m. today under a banner that states, in part, "Free Case Evaluation" (though the banner doesn't turn up in the pdf: NolanLawGroup2%3A16@1-56pm.pdf The juxtaposition of an "article" on the crash with "Free Case Evaluation" speaks volumes, to me, of the intent of the web site. (h/t Jennifer Liddy in the comments of prior post.)

A third out-of-state firm, The Gibson Law Firm of Houston, has also started running Google ads that respond to the Flight 3407 search inquiry:/Flight3407Search2%3A16@2-53.pdf Hitting the ad brings us to this page /GibsonLawFirm2%3A16@2-56pm.pdf with stuff written about the crash next to a sidebar that offers "Have your case reviewed today." Gibson even goes so far as to claim that the Continental crash is one of their "practice areas." /GibsonPracticeAreas.pdf

All of this is the type of stuff that New York's new ethics rule was designed, I think, to combat. The ethics rules also clearly apply to out-of-state attorneys:

Extra-Territorial Application of Solicitation Rules

EC 2-21 All of the special solicitation rules, including the special 30 day (or 15 day) rule, apply to solicitations directed to recipients in New York, whether made by a lawyer admitted in New York or a lawyer admitted in any another jurisdiction.

By soliciting for a New York accident it would seem to make any potential defense that New York has no jurisdiction over them particularly difficult.

Also on the list Google search list is the office of Jonathan Reiter, who had previously had an ad up with a specific reference to the flight, and then had it pulled down when he was alerted to my blog posting. The ad still pops up, though, with a search of "Flight 3407," which seems to indicate an attempt to coax victim's families to the site without explicitly stating the name of the flight in the ad.

As I noted in that prior post, when marketing and ethics are entwined, then outsourcing the marketing results in an outsourcing of ethics. Any firm that doesn't have an admitted lawyer directly overseeing every marketing decision runs the risk of a mistake that can ruin a career.

It's also worth noting that there are federal penalties for soliciting after air disasters (though I have confined all prior discussion to New York's ethics rules and how they come into play regardless of the type of disaster). Federal law prohibits solicitations within 45 days. As per 49 U.S.C. 1136 (G)(2):

(2) Unsolicited communications.-- In the event of an accident involving an air carrier providing interstate or foreign air transportation and in the event of an accident involving a foreign air carrier that occurs within the United States, no unsolicited communication concerning a potential action for personal injury or wrongful death may be made by an attorney (including any associate, agent, employee, or other representative of an attorney) or any potential party to the litigation to an individual injured in the accident, or to a relative of an individual involved in the accident, before the 45th day following the date of the accident.

This law was passed in the wake of TWA Flight 800 crashing off the coast of Long Island. You can read background on the history of the law here. The issue here will be whether running ads on Google constitutes a "solicitation."

What state and federal authorities intend to do with these people remains to be seen. Clearly, it seems, as lawyers try to fuzz the line of solicitation, then First Amendment battles will come to the forefront. There is one currently pending before the Second Circuit, which I previously discussed regarding some of the ways that marketers might try to beat the rules and the First Amendment issues that they create: New York's Anti-Solicitation Rule Allows For Ethics Laundering and Must Be Modified.

--------------------------
Updated 2/16/09 8:52 p.m. -- A third Chicago law firm is now directly soliciting clients via Google Adwords and their website, the Clifford Law Firm. A search of "Buffalo Plane Crash" (h/t Dano in the comments) returns this ad (/BuffaloPlaneCrashSearch2%3A16@8-52.pdf):

Buffalo Plane Crash
aviation.cliffordlaw.com
Experienced Airline Disaster And Wrongful Death Lawyers.

The caption of the webpage is this: Buffalo NY Plane Crash Involved Turboprop Plane: We have aviation attorneys with experience in plane crash claims involving turboprop aircraft.
The page is here: /BuffaloPlaneCrash-CliffordLaw.pdf

I'll say this about Chicago personal injury bar: Right now they're making the rest of us look good.

And as a refresher, this is the definition of solicitation in New York according to Ethical Consideration (EC) 2-18 of the Code of Professional Responsibility:

A "solicitation" means any advertisement:
a) which is initiated by a lawyer or law firm (as opposed to a communication made in response to an inquiry initiated by a potential client);
b) with a primary purpose of persuading recipients to retain the lawyer or law firm (as opposed to providing educational information about the law) (see EC 2-6(c));
c) which has as a significant motive for the lawyer to make money (as opposed to a public interest lawyer offering pro bono services); and
d) which is directed to or targeted at a specific recipient or group of recipients, or their family members or legal representatives.

It is clearly my opinion that, in using "Buffalo" and "Flight 3407" in Google Ads, as it appears is happening, that the "primary purpose" of the ads is to persuade the targets to retain the firm.
-------------------------------------
2/17/09 Update: DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

I received a phone call moments ago from a very upset Jonathan Reiter, a local attorney whose office ran this ad this morning regarding the crash of Colgan Air / Continental Flight 3407:

Continental Crash Victim?
Helping Victims of Flight 3407
Contact Our Aviation Attorneys
www.jcReiterLaw.com
New York

Reiter told me that, when he heard of the ad, he ordered it taken down immediately and "has basically taken the head off the guy that did this." That ad is now gone.

But here is the crux of the problem: Attorney advertising and ethics are deeply entwined. And so, when the advertising is outsourced, then the ethics get outsourced with it.

See also, from November 2007: The Ethics of Attorney Search Services.

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash

When I wrote three weeks ago about the possibility of the Hudson River splash landing testing New York's 30-day anti-solicitation rules for attorneys, I did it with a question mark and with one eye firmly on the fact that it ended very well for the people on board the plane. It even ended well for the bar, as I found only one firm that appeared to violate the ethics rule. It also led me to explore, while the Second Circuit considered the issues of New York's new rules, the myriad ways that ethics laundering can take place with lawyers hiring attorney search services to solicit, or running "articles" on their web sites about the crash.

I didn't expect to write again so soon on the subject, but today's horror in Buffalo with Colgan Air / Continental Flight 3407 crashing and killing 50 people will bring the subject of attorney ethics and the 30-day anti-solicitation rule right back to the forefront. You can read much more about the rules at the prior links, but this is the starting point from New York's Code of Professional Responsibility:

DR 7-111 (22 NYCRR 1200.41-a) Communication After Incidents Involving Personal Injury or Wrongful Death

(a) In the event of an incident involving potential claims for personal injury or wrongful death, no unsolicited communication shall be made to an individual injured in the incident or to a family member or legal representative of such an individual, by a lawyer or law firm, or by any associate, agent, employee or other representative of a lawyer or law firm, seeking to represent the injured individual or legal representative thereof in potential litigation or in a proceeding arising out of the incident before the 30th day after the date of the incident, unless a filing must be made within 30 days of the incident as a legal prerequisite to the particular claim, in which case no unsolicited communication shall be made before the 15th day after the date of the incident.

My analysis below -- which will be updated in the future to provide for reactions from the bar to the crash -- is limited to use of Google searches. First we'll look at sponsored ads, and then natural search results.

Sponsored ads:

• At 6:51 this morning I Googled "Buffalo Plane Crash" and came up with zero sponsored ads:/BuffaloPlaneCrash-2%3A13@6-51am.pdf
• At 6:55 I added "attorney" to the search phrase and came up with a few aviation firms that seem to have stock ads, but nothing obviously geared toward Buffalo:/BuffaloPlaneCrashAttorney-2%3A13@6-55am.pdf
• At 10:42, you now see some sponsored results for "Buffalo Plane Crash." These don't reference Buffalo in the ad, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a keyword that a marketer added to the search Google Adwords terms that would return this response. To me, a very subtle, but significant means of breaching the rules if that is how it was done. /BuffaloPlaneCrash-2%3A13@10-42am.pdf

The chance of this changing as attorneys try to solicit via the web is high, but at least the starting point has been frozen in time.

Update #1 (2/13 @ 12:32) - The first ad directly soliciting victims has now appeared. It is by the same attorney that ran an ad after the Hudson River crash. Here is the pdf:/BuffaloPlaneCrash-11%3A13-12-32pm.pdf And here is the ad:

Continental Crash Victim?
Helping Victims of Flight 3407
Contact Our Aviation Attorneys
www.jcReiterLaw.com
New York

Update #2 (4:44): I received a call from Reiter, and the ad was taken down.

Update #3 (10:07 pm): Buffalo law blogger Roy Mura (Coverage Counsel) found another ad that directly solicits for this accident, from Philadelphia attorney Joseph Messa. (Welcome to New York, Joe. Now please leave.) You can find the link in the comments to this post.

At the same comment by Mura we learn that the Buffalo firm of O'Brien Boyd now surfaces with the search term "Buffalo plane crash." At their web site, the text now reads:

We have already received several phone calls about what happens when someone dies in a plane crash. As a public service, we wanted to provide some information to the general public. In any negligence case, the legal system asks two basic questions: ...

Also in the search findings for "Buffalo Plane Crash" are these firms, among others, whose names did not appear at 6:51 this morning when I used this search phrase, leading me to believe that the Google Adwords accounts were edited to add words specifically for this accident while not using the words in the ad itself. (Or this is a Google issue where sometimes stuff shows up and sometimes not.) Here is the pdf:/BuffaloPlaneCrash2%3A13@9-59pm.pdf

• Rosenberg, Minc, Falkoff & Wolff. The firm appears under NY Plane Crash Lawyers (nycaccident.com) and claims to be the oldest PI firm in NYC;
  
• Masry & Vititoe, a California firm made famous by Erin Brokovich; and
  
• Injury Helpline Attorney, an attorney search service, which shows what happens to law firms when they outsource their marketing to others.
  

I discussed this technique of using certain keywords in the Google Adwords system to make the ad pop up, while hiding the actual words from public view, in this post: New York's Anti-Solicitation Rule Allows For Ethics Laundering and Must Be Modified. To actually prove ethics violations here would probably require subpoenas of Google's records for the accounts due to variations on how Google puts up its sponsored results.


Natural Results:
Law firms might come up in the natural results if they wrote about the crash on their web site. Some have a "blog," and I use that term loosely in this context, that does nothing more than run stories on local accidents. I discussed in December 2007 how such a blog can be used for attorney solicitation. As you will see this presents First Amendment issues. Writing about an event is one thing, but what happens when you tie it in with a solicitation? A story is run followed by "If you or a loved one has been killed or injured..." There are a million shades of gray as to how that is done.

Update #1 - And the first website I have found that hits page one of the natural results (search term: Buffalo Plane crash attorney) is Parker Waichman. Here is the pdf of the search: /BuffaloPlaneCrashAttorney2%3A13@12-43am.pdf

When you follow the link you find a story of the accident right next to a "Free Case Review" for airline accidents. Note that "Buffalo Plane Crash Continental Flight 3407" is in the title bar for optimum search engine results. And that is a great example of how the First Amendment and New York's anti-solicitation rules clash.

It's important to note, by the way, that these rules apply to out-of-state attorneys who may try to solicit in New York (only to refer, the case, no doubt, to local counsel). That rule specifically states:

Extra-Territorial Application of Solicitation Rules

EC 2-21 All of the special solicitation rules, including the special 30 day (or 15 day) rule, apply to solicitations directed to recipients in New York, whether made by a lawyer admitted in New York or a lawyer admitted in any another jurisdiction.

The rule also applies to "agents" of the firms, which to me means any of of the dozens of attorney search services that exist and who might break the rules while doing their marketing. The attorney who hired the firm would not doubt be "shocked" to find such conduct taking place.

I hate writing about this stuff in the midst of such a tragedy. But the brutal reality is that, after the Staten Island Ferry crashed in 2003 killing 11 people, the local paper was flooded with ads coming in that afternoon for the next day's paper. With the new rules in place, it seems important to take a snapshot of the situation before any ads are run, to see how it contrasts with what will likely happen.

=====================
2/16/09 Update: Flight 3407 (Buffalo Crash) Web Site Established By Law Firm (Contravening Ethics Rules?)

2/17/09 Update: DC Firm Jumps Into Cyber-Solicitation Fray, Chasing Buffalo Air Crash Clients

Labels: Attorney Ethics, Buffalo Plane Crash, Marketing