ABA MODEL RULE 7.3 (SOLICITATION OF CLIENTS)

Information About Legal Services

(a) “Solicitation” or “solicit” denotes a communication initiated by or on behalf of a lawyer or law firm that is directed to a specific person the lawyer knows or reasonably should know needs legal services in a particular matter and that offers to provide, or reasonably can be understood as offering to provide, legal services for that matter.

(b) A lawyer shall not solicit professional employment by live person-to-person contact when a significant motive for the lawyer’s doing so is the lawyer’s or law firm’s pecuniary gain, unless the contact is with a:

  • (1) lawyer;
  • (2) person who has a family, close personal, or prior business or professional relationship with the lawyer or law firm; or
  • (3) person who routinely uses for business purposes the type of legal services offered by the lawyer.

(c) A lawyer shall not solicit professional employment even when not otherwise prohibited by paragraph (b), if:

  • (1) the target of the solicitation has made known to the lawyer a desire not to be solicited by the lawyer; or
  • (2) the solicitation involves coercion, duress or harassment.

(d) This Rule does not prohibit communications authorized by law or ordered by a court or other tribunal.

(e) Notwithstanding the prohibitions in this Rule, a lawyer may participate with a prepaid or group legal service plan operated by an organization not owned or directed by the lawyer that uses live person-to-person contact to enroll members or sell subscriptions for the plan from persons who are not known to need legal services in a particular matter covered by the plan.

Annotations

This rule number is “reserved.” ABA Model Rule of Professional Conduct 7.3 addresses direct contact with prospective clients. See Model Rules of Prof’l Cond. r. 7.3 (Am. Bar Ass’n). The Louisiana rules address this topic in Louisiana Rule of Professional Conduct 7.4.

Notes