Here is a perfect example of where legal ethics and ethics diverge.
The Supreme Judicial Court of Maine reprimanded veteran Maine lawyer Eric B. Cote for investigating the background of Rory Holland—leading a “one man crusade” was how the court put it— after Holland was convicted of a double murder and sentenced to two life sentences. Cote was convinced that Holland was a serial killer, and that there were other victims. Cote set out to find out who they were.
What’s wrong with that, you ask? Well, Cote had represented the convicted murderer in a real estate transaction. The reasons he suspected Holland came from information he learned in the course of the representation, and under the ethics rules of every state, he cannot reveal such information for the benefit of others to the detriment of a current or former client.
Cote could use the incriminating confidences, if he chose to, if doing so seemed necessary to prevent Holland from killing someone. But Holland is in prison, presumably for the rest of his life. Solving unsolved murders Holland may have already committed does not, according to Maine Rule of Professional Responsibility 1.6, justify violating his former client’s confidence. If, somehow, Holland came up for parole or commutation, Cote would then have a viable argument that revealing his suspicions based on confidences learned during the real estate matter was within the limitations of the Maine ethics rules, which permit him to do so ” to prevent reasonably certain substantial bodily harm or death.” While Holland is safely locked away, however, the integrity of the attorney-client relationship takes precedence…as it should and must.
Citing Cote’s hitherto unblemished disciplinary record, the court said that a public reprimand was the appropriate sanction, but it ordered Cote not to take any further action adverse to Holland. If he does, he would be presumably face suspension or disbarment.
You can read the opinion here.
Ethics Alarms 
And just how does Maine’s rule of Professional responsibility 1.6 help the possibly multitude of persons whose loved ones fates remain unresolved? The “ETHIC” as even the State of Maine burdens the”citizens” with is that If you know you should speak out,and,in my opinion,is how it “should be” past is past and utilizing common sense and based on the circumstances ie; billy stole a candy bar when he was 9,vs. jack potentially killed 3 people is a no brainer and “We the people” need to stop the inane black and white of legal mumbo jumbo, and use common sense and practical reality and circumstances. To protect a “Rory” because he is already in prison is asinine and hypocritical.
So do you want to be able to tell lawyers everything about your case in full trust that he’s on your side and will keep your confidences or not? Because it’s either absolute, or it’s no promise at all. You think a lawyer is working to keep you out of jail, and it turns out he’s decided that “justice” requires him to betray you. There are narrow exceptions to confidentiality rules, and if lawyers can break them at will, then none of us, even non-serial killers, can ever have a true legal champion.
to me again that question in itself shows that “we” and I do infact include myself reluctently,play with “ethics” I agree in the confidentiality however if I am guilty and in my admissions to an attorney it does nothing to exonerate my deeds but deepens the proof of my indescretions then so they should,guilt is guilt,again common sense and circumstance need to be administered. If we know a woman or child is being abused people would be up in arms as with the baby recently killed in arundel, people saw and told people about prior abuses and noone took action now a child is dead. If a client were being charged with OUI and in the course of his defense an attorney learns that the client killed someone in a different state or took part in a bank robbery,then as a “ethical’ human being yes! he should disclose the information. Justice is and should be served for the innocent who via disclosure no ill deeds would be found.