Lawyers must have clients to maintain a practice. To get those clients, they must solicit, one way or another. The once restrictive rules for solicitation have been greatly diminished in recent years and today we are bombarded by promotional techniques that are distasteful.
Even with our current permissive standards, however, it's impossible not to be repulsed by certain tactics. Take for example, the free-wheeling approach of Lindeman, Alvarado & Frye.
This Houston law firm represents "clients charged with a full range of sex crimes in which children were the alleged victims, including:
In our justice system everyone is entitled to a defense. Everyone is considered innocent until proven guilty, and we as a society agree that it is better to let a guilty person go free than take away the rights and freedom of an innocent person.
On that we all can agree. It's the nature of the firm's solicitation that's disturbing. A page on its Web site devoted to "Child Sexual Assault & Internet Solicitation of a Minor" until recently featured a photograph of an attractive blonde teen voguing as "jailbait."
Instead of a solicitation for clients accused of unsavory activities, the page seemed almost to be an enticement. Now we know the answer to the question in the limbo song: How low can you go?
A posting about the "Kiddie Porn Practice Group" on AboveTheLaw.com evidently prompted Lindeman, Alvarado & Frye to replace the provocative photo, and others like it, with a picture of their smiling staff.
Let's hope they're done with the limbo.