I thought nothing could make me smile in 2010 like the lawyer who told her client she was possessed. This isn’t as spectacular, but it sure is welcome.

The Illinois Administrator has filed a complaint alleging that an attorney falsely certified that he had completed online Continuing Legal Education ( CLE) courses when he actually had his secretary watch the seminars and respond to the periodic prompts required that are supposed to prove that the lawyer is paying attention.

From the complaint:

“….Respondent reported to the MCLE Board that he had completed 20 hours of CLE credit (including 4 hours of professional responsibility credit) during the 2007 to 2009 reporting period. Respondent made the report on the MCLE Board’s online reporting system and certified each statement set forth below:

I am the attorney identified at the top of this form.

I certify that the information contained in this certification to the MCLE Board is true and correct.

I have read MCLE Rule 796 of the Supreme Court of Illinois which lists the penalties for submitting an inaccurate or a false certification to the MCLE Board.

Respondent’s submission of information and certification to the MCLE Board was false. Respondent knew that the information and certification he submitted to the MCLE Board were false because he did not complete 20 hours of CLE classes during the reporting period and he directed a secretary to complete some of the CLE classes for him.”

Why do I like this so much?

• It’s about time. I have given legal ethics CLE seminars for more than a decade, and have occasionally watched lawyers do billable work, read the paper, or dream of sex in my classes, and later certify that they attended the session and fully participated. (Not many do this in my classes, because 1) they aren’t boring, and 2) I throw them out if I catch them.)

• The story points up the degree to which online courses, though lucrative for bar associations and CLE providers and convenient for attorneys, are largely a fraud on the public, which is assured that lawyers meet mandatory yearly requirements of ongoing instruction in their craft. How many lawyers fake it? Nobody knows, but the consensus in the profession is “a lot.” This guy just got caught.

• I do live presentations (though some are subsequently shown on video), and strongly believe that is the only way to teach legal ethics in a manner that has any chance of leading to a more ethical legal profession. There are no secretaries at my seminars.

Perhaps most of all, I love this:  one of the courses the lawyer pretended to attend was subtitled “10 Ways to Reduce Your Chances of Being Sued or Disciplined.”

[Thanks to the Legal Profession Blog for the story,]