Prohibiting lawyer-client sex.
Psychotherapists' and physicians' sexual contact with their patients has been long held as unethical conduct. However, lawyers' sexual contact with clients has been largely ignored in the professional literature. This article uniquely anatomizes the similarities in the vulnerabilities and power imbalances that exist between psychotherapists' and lawyers' relationships with patients/clients. These characteristics enable the professional to exert undue influence over the less-powerful party, and for these reasons lawyers should be held to fiduciary standards in their personal dealings with clients. The authors propose a rebuttable presumption that sexual contact between an attorney and client was obtained through the attorney's exercise of undue influence and was therefore a breach of the attorney's fiduciary duties to the client.
Gutheil
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Program in Psychiatry and the Law, Massachusetts Mental Health Center, Boston 02115.
Jorgenson
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Sutherland
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D003416:Criminal Law; D004992:Ethics, Medical; D004995:Ethics, Professional; D006801:Humans; D008318:Malpractice / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D011361:Professional Competence / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D011613:Psychotherapy; D012725:Sexual Behavior; D014481:United States