The Emerging Legal Landscape: Ethical and Practical Considerations Surrounding Litigation Financing and Ownership of Law Firms by Non-Lawyers (Webinar)

Vorys partners Jocelyn Hoffman, Tim McGranor and Ken Rubin presented a webinar as part of the Vorys University: 2025 Professional Conduct & Ethics Webinar Series on December 4.

The title of the presentation was "The Emerging Legal Landscape: Ethical and Practical Considerations Surrounding Litigation Financing and Ownership of Law Firms by Non-Lawyers," exploring ethical and practical considerations when non-lawyers become involved in the practice of law, focusing on litigation funding and new rules that have been adopted in some jurisdictions to relax restrictions on non-lawyers having an ownership interest in a law firm.  Among the topics discussed were:

• traditional rules prohibiting sharing fees and the gradual evolution of those limits;
• litigation funding: who is doing it, how it can work and the ethical and practical considerations when working with a funder;
• current proposals for rules requiring disclosure of funding and what future restrictions may be adopted;
• Arizona’s recent elimination of its version of ABA Model Rule 5.4 to allow non-lawyers to have ownership and management roles in law firms and the potential ethical and practical considerations; 
• Other states’ exploration of similar rules to allow non-lawyers to become owners of law firms and more.