The Conflict Check Most Law Firms Skip at Intake (and the Names It Misses)

I attended a CLE webinar this week, and one of the attorney questions stuck with me: how do you handle conflict checks when a new case comes in? The answer was to review the ethics guidance and search online for the parties. It was clear from the discussion that many firms have no reliable way to do it at intake.

That matches what we see from the expert side of the table. Most firms run a name through their case management system, see no hit and open the file. That is a search. It is not a conflict check, and the gap between the two is where disqualification motions come from.

What the rules actually ask you to check

The ABA Model Rules, and the state rules built on them, point to at least five groups of people a firm has to clear before taking a matter:

• Current clients (Rule 1.7). Is the new client, or anyone on the other side, someone the firm represents right now, in any matter?
• Former clients (Rule 1.9). Did the firm ever represent the other side in the same or a substantially related matter?
• Prospective clients (Rule 1.18). Did the other side ever call the firm, fill out the intake form or sit for a consultation, even if the firm turned them down? If they shared information that could significantly harm them, the firm can be blocked from taking the case against them.
• The firm’s own people (Rule 1.10). Conflicts follow lawyers. A lateral hire, and sometimes a paralegal or nurse consultant, can bring conflicts from a prior firm, and those conflicts can be imputed to everyone.
• Related parties. Spouses, guardians and estates on your side. On the other side, the parent company, the operator, the management company and the insurer.

The rules tell you what a conflict is. They do not tell you whether you have one. Only your own records can answer that.

Where a name search fails

The declined intake. The prospective client who called eight months ago and was turned away is the one firms miss most. That call often lives in a voicemail, a web form or an intake spreadsheet that nobody ever entered into the case system. Rule 1.18 still applies to it.

The company behind the name. This is the big one in nursing home and medical malpractice cases. The facility in the caption usually operates under its own legal entity. The company that owns it, the company that manages it and the company that employs the staff can all have different names. If the firm already represents, or once sued, one of those related companies, a search for the facility name will come back clean.

Name variations. Maiden names, hyphenated names, “Saint” versus “St.”, an LLC that dropped a word. Exact-match searches miss all of them.

The lateral hire. A new associate’s prior matters sit in the old firm’s system, not yours, unless someone collected and entered them on day one.

Your expert. The client is cleared, the case is signed, and six months later opposing counsel learns your nurse expert worked weekends at the defendant’s sister facility during the incident window. That one does not disqualify the firm. It costs you the expert, the report and often the schedule.

An intake conflict check that holds up

1. Collect every name before the consultation goes deep. The potential client, every adverse party, every facility, the treating providers and the insurer. Limit what the prospective client tells you until the check is done, which also limits your Rule 1.18 exposure.
2. Check current clients, former clients and prospective clients. That means declined intakes too, not just signed matters.
3. Look up the ownership chain. For every company and facility, identify the parent, the operator and the management company, then check those names too.
4. Check your people. Keep a list of each lateral hire’s prior matters and run new cases against it.
5. Clear the expert before records go out. Ask the expert to check the full caption, including facility ownership, against their own case history and employers.
6. Write it down. Record who checked, what was searched, what came close and how it was resolved, with the date. If a motion to disqualify is ever filed, that record is your answer.

What we are building

We built ConflictPro for our own expert practice, because spreadsheets and memory were not catching conflicts hidden behind different company names. It already traces facilities to their parent and operating companies, catches name variations and writes a dated result to every case. Every expert we place is cleared this way before records change hands.

We are now working on a version for law firm intake: current, former and prospective clients, related companies and lateral hires, checked in one pass. If your firm struggles with conflict checks at intake, we would like to hear what it would need to catch. Call us at 844-633-5345 and ask about ConflictPro for law firms. Your input will help shape what we build.

How Med Legal Pro helps

We work with attorneys on both sides in medical malpractice, personal injury, nursing home and wrongful death cases, and every expert we place is screened for conflicts before records are sent. Call 844-633-5345 or submit a case.

This article is for informational purposes only and is not legal advice. Check the conflict rules in your own jurisdiction.