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The Pros And Cons Of Paralegals: Unauthorized Practice Of Law

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Mr. Stan Smith called his friend Polly who is a paralegal and left her a message asking if the grounds for divorce in North Carolina include adultery. Polly is help to certain standards as a paralegal and should not engage in unauthorized practice of law. Therefore, Polly should not answer Mr. Smith’s question. Paralegals have certain ethical standards and rules they must follow. The National Association of Legal Assistants states that paralegals should not engage in any act that can be classified as unauthorized practice of law. Legal Assistants should not give legal advice or give their legal opinions to clients or friend (National Association of Legal Assistants, 2008). Legal assistants do not go to school as long as lawyers do, and to work under the supervision of an attorney. The paralegal does not want to give wrong advice to a client as they can be sued for giving wrong advice. Paralegals have other duties to do …show more content…
Attorneys are responsible for the action of their employees working under them, and must train the paralegals. Paralegals cannot perform or engage in any action that can be classified as unauthorized practice of law. Paralegals are not allowed to give opinions, establish client-attorney relationships, and are not allowed to hive advice to clients or potential clients (National Association of Legal Assistants, 2008). Unauthorized practice of law is not uniform with each state regulation, so Polly would want to be familiar with her state and what they consider UPL. UPL can be defined as giving legal advice, or preparing legal documents for clients without being supervised by an attorney (Denckla, 1999). Paralegals are faced with ethical situations and dilemmas every day, and need to know the proper ethical way to handle situations. Since Polly is not a lawyer she should not be giving Legal advice to Mrs.

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