MISSISSIPPI LEGISLATURE

2000 Regular Session

To: Judiciary

By: Senator(s) Ross

AN ACT TO AMEND SECTION 73-3-37, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, TO CLARIFY AN ATTORNEY'S RESPONSIBILITY TO REPRESENT AN INDIVIDUAL INSURED REGARDLESS OF WHETHER UNDERTAKEN UNDER A RESERVATION OF RIGHTS BY THE CARRIER; AND FOR RELATED PURPOSES.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI:

SECTION 1. Section 73-3-37, Mississippi Code of 1972, is amended as follows:

73-3-37. It is the duty of attorneys:

(a) To support the Constitution and laws of this state and of the United States;

(b) To maintain the respect due to courts of justice and judicial officers;

(c) To employ for the purpose of maintaining the causes confided to them, such means only as are consistent with truth, and never to seek to mislead by any artifice or false statement of the law;

(d) To maintain inviolate the confidence and, at every peril to themselves, to preserve the secrets of their clients;

(e) To abstain from all offensive personalities, and to advance no fact prejudicial to the honor or reputation of a party or witness, unless required by the justice of the cause with which they are charged;

(f) To encourage neither the commencement nor continuance of an action or proceeding from any motives of passion or personal interest;

(g) Never to reject, for any consideration personal to themselves, the cause of the defenseless or oppressed;

(h) When an attorney is offered employment by an insurance carrier to defend a lawsuit under the terms of a policy of insurance, the following apply:

(i) The attorney's representation will be of the individual insured;

(ii) The attorney may share information with the insurance carrier only insofar as the information is not detrimental to his client, the insured;

(iii) The attorney can represent the individual insured as to all claims in the lawsuit arising under the same facts, even if the claims are not covered by the policy, and even under a reservation of rights by the insurance carrier; and

(iv) The insurance carrier has the right to have its own counsel present at all proceedings, including discovery, subject to the requirements of this paragraph (h).

SECTION 2. This act shall take effect and be in force from and after July 1, 2000.