# 6841 f13a Week 4

## Case Study

Is it right that barristers should always keep client secrets secret?
Or could some secrets be revealed for overriding reasons even when you are not supposed to tell them?

Each speaker has 2 minutes. Judge to provide 30 second warning

### Notes:
Human weaknesses
Conflict of interest
nature of trust
secrets - is it easy to keep a secret
type1 and type2 errors

try to relate your arguments to any of the above
clearly answer the question

state position, then reason, then evidence (from lawyer x)

---
### Group 1
Judge:
- Alwin

In favour:
- Raymond
- Daryl

Against:
- Toshi
- Bonnie

Points in favour (Barristers should always keep secrets):
- Privacy between clients - right to be represented legally. Lawyer should be covered by the privacy law. Forced to reveal secrets. Prosecuter can use secrets to prosecute unfairly. DOn't have to turn a blind eye. THey can refuse to represent. There are already laws to allow reporting to police if there is a risk.
- Transparency can lead to biases. Lawyer X wrongfully convicted
- c

Points against (There are situations where they should not keep secrets):
- tl;dr everything underneath here LOL
- g
- h

Notes for against:
- If there is a significant risk to someone's life the client should tell the barrister, they should be able to tell authorities. There is an ethical obligation to ensure that no further harm comes to others. Ones life is priceless and breaking trust is a worthwhile trade.This has been shown in the German plane crash where a co-pilot intentionally crashed the plane due to poor mental health
- Evidence should not be hidden from the judge. If the barrister has evidence that they are not revealing due to incriminating the person they are defending, they are obstructing justice. All evidence should be available to both parties. If there is irrefutable proof of ones innocence, then that information must be made available. Likewise for damning evidence. Breaching trust is a worthwhile trade if it insures that people are given the correct sentence (or lack of sentence)
- There is an inherent problem with having a human defending someone. Humans are inherently biased and our judgement can be flawed based on evidence given. There are always flaws in eye-witness accounts due to a lapse in memory or a misheld belief in what their saw.
- Generally, the barrister should keep secrets to ensure a trusting relationship with the client, however, this is not *always* the case. There are exceptions.
- Keeping secrets can cause assumptions or gossip to arise from a lack of understanding, which could potentially lead to a disruption in community. Transparency can create understanding and prevent conflicts from occuring. For example in the My Lai Massacre, Hugh Thompson leaking information on US soldiers killing civilians allowed people to discover that despite the Vietnamese being enemies, they received unlawful treatment. Those who committed those crimes are also able to receive fitting punishment.

- can help settle conflicts of interest rather than keep all motives to oneself. This isn't to say that everything needs to be revealed. Eg: while Lawyer X was known to be working with criminals, not enough was known about what she was doing for the other police officers to empathise with her position, and rather, they targeted her for being successful at her job.
---
### Group 2
Judge:
- Sean

In favour:
- Stephanie
- Sean

Against:
- Nic
- siqi zhu

Points in favour:
- The whole basis of the lawyer system is built on confidentiality. It would undermine their use in general.
- Lawyers could potentialy divulge secrets that are not life threatening or important without consequences.
- Without the use of lawyers justice would be harder to achieve.
-

- The purpose of lawyers is to remove 'unfairness' if one side has knowledge of the lawyer and the other doesn't
- The basis of fair trial is that clients should be able to completely trust in their lawyers
- This assumes that the lawyer is acting in their self interest
- The lawyers role is to act on behalf of the client, in order to do this successfully, the lawyer has to know everything that the client knows.
- If a client has a fear that the lawyer is not acting in their best interest, then they cannot use that lawyer, and are not given a fair trial.
- Evidence of this: Gobbo convinced her client to talk to the police (she also edited his statements), this allowed the police to make another arrest, who Gobbo also then represented (thereby getting more work for herself)

- Are their situations where confidentiality is allowed to be broken?
- Is it the role of the lawyer to prevent the crimes of their clients?
- Who decides what lawyers can share?
Points against:
- barristers shouldn't keep clients secrets as secrets because
- Threats to National Security
- If Lawyer X knew that there will be another hit soon, why wouldn't she share that with authorities
- Some things are in public interest
- Prevent future crimes
- help building the cases which lack of evidence
- If client is about to break law, lawyers can and should have powers to alert authorities BEFORE the crime occurs
- There are limits to this, lawyers can't share everything, needs to be legistlation to prevent conflicts of interest
- Lawyers should be able to trust their clients as well
- Clients should not be able to take advantage of the privacy between them and the lawyer to perform more crimes
- lawyers are citizens as well, informed/witness a crime should report to police
- If lawyers feel like they're in danger, they should be able to speak up
-
---
### Group 3
Judge:
- Edward

In favour:
- Aaron
- Edward

Against:
- Jonny
- Phillip

Points in favour:
- Conflict of interest --> barrister's have a job to protect their client's interest in the eyes of the law. If not then that job is useless. If there is a barrister that works as a double agent, what's there to say they aren't currently working as a triple agent?
- By the time Ms Gobbo was finished, the royal commission said her misconduct had potentially contaminated the cases of 1011 individuals, of which 124 people could have been falsely convicted by her actions as an informer or by manipulating others to inform on them.
- Preserves their right to a fair trial
- "If your barrister is secretly feeding secrets to the police, it is no longer a fair trial"
- A barrister acting on both sides can sway the result of a trial
- That responsibility should not be given to one person, especially if they are acting on both sides
- Type I/II errors - the secret could be relevant but it could also not be, barrister could be biased, potentially untrustworthy
-

Points against:
- Barristers shouldn't keep clients secrets as secrets in the case where the barrister knows of evidence related to their client and the trial that hasn't been included.
- Reasoning: If the client is hiding evidence from the trial or the trial doesn't have certain evidence, the barrister can notify the police/investigators of this evidence so it can be included. This actually makes the trial fairer because it has more evidence.
- saves government spending and speeds up justice if client directly confess to their barrister, and barrister comes forward.
- Reasoning: while Nicola Gobbo was an informant she able to help Victoria police with nearly 400 arrests.
- The client has the right to remain silent i.e. they can choose to incriminate themselves by talking about their secrets to their barrister.

---
### Group 4
Judge:
- student name

In favour:
- student name
- student name

Against:
- student name
- student name

Points in favour:
- a
- b
- c

Points against:
- f
- g
- h
---
### Group 5
Judge:
- student name

In favour:
- student name
- student name

Against:
- student name
- student name

Points in favour:
- a
- b
- c

Points against:
- f
- g
- h
---