In January 2025, Southern California was hit with a series of devastating wildfires, including two in densely populated areas.
One fire killed 19 people and ripped through at least 9,418 buildings in Altadena, a diverse community in Los Angeles County where many Black families purchased homes in the mid-20th century. Another fire destroyed more than 23,000 acres and 7,000 structures in the Pacific Palisades, a tony coastal section of the west side of Los Angeles; 12 people died.
In the aftermath, the lawyers came in droves. One attorney described it to the Los Angeles Daily News as a “feeding frenzy.” Legal needs often centered on filing insurance claims and the basics of litigation.
California has a history of natural disasters, including large-scale fires, and experience with how to handle overzealous lawyers and scam artists. The state bar quickly warned attorneys and the public that victims shouldn’t be pressured to sign on to legal services “in haste.”
“The legal processes for a disaster of this magnitude often will take place over many months and even years,” the State Bar of California said in a January 2025 news release. “There is time for fire victims to ensure they are getting the best legal services possible for them and their families.”
Every state has rules restricting how lawyers solicit clients. The rules are designed to prevent coercion, overreaching or harassment, which, ethics lawyers say, is more likely to occur in person.
After a natural disaster, it can be confusing to know what conduct is appropriate and what falls outside the scope of the rules, ethics lawyers say, particularly for lawyers located outside the state. After the deadly 2023 wildfire ripped through the island of Maui, Hawaii saw an influx of mainland lawyers offering their services.
“Most lawyers are genuinely trying to do the right thing, but they are often operating in what seems to be a gray area,” says Ryan Little, a former Hawaii state bar prosecutor who helps attorneys navigate legal ethics and risk management. “The expectations and requirements of each state can be different, so what’s permitted in California may not be permitted in Hawaii.”
Sarvenaz Bahar was the president of the Los Angeles County Bar Association when the 2025 fires started. She knew lawyers wanted to provide aid and could play a crucial role in helping fire victims get the information and assistance they needed. Bahar spearheaded efforts to create an online library of legal resources and organize opportunities for lawyers to volunteer their efforts and educate the public. The group also collaborated with disaster relief partners and clinics to support their need for volunteers and subject matter experts.
“We had direct access to so many lawyers whose knowledge and expertise were in need and a unique platform to facilitate collaboration,” she says. And she was mindful to promote free programming from nonprofit and governmental organizations and not link to or otherwise promote particular law firms or lawyers.
“We were not interested in getting business for lawyers,” she says. “This was about access to information so people could make their best decisions in the middle of a tremendous crisis.”
But not all lawyers were as thoughtful. In response to complaints, California enacted a law in October strengthening existing prohibitions on misleading attorney advertisements and solicitations. It allows individuals to bring civil actions against people soliciting clients for lawyers at locations where solicitation is prohibited.
David Majchrzak is president of the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers and specializes in legal ethics dand litigation as general counsel and partner at Rosing Pott & Strohbehn in San Diego. He says every state must assess how best to create and enforce its own client solicitation rules.
“We want to assist people, and we want them to get the services that they need. And as a profession, we are balancing that against giving them the space that they need to decide whether they need legal representation and, if so, who should represent them,” he says. “When we do our jobs right, we are helping people solve problems, often at the lowest points in their lives.”
But, he adds, “We don’t want to have lawyers unduly pressuring the vulnerable, and sometimes that happens.”
Dru Stevenson is a professor specializing in professional responsibility and legal ethics at South Texas College of Law Houston. He says the profession has a “tradition of ambivalence” when it comes to lawyer solicitation and advertisement.
Historically, Stevenson says, the legal profession has looked down on lawyer solicitation and advertisements, viewing both as unprofessional and undignified. Direct solicitation of clients was deemed too aggressive and potentially affected public respect for both the legal profession and the rule of law.
The American Bar Association’s early rules of professional conduct reflected this sentiment, strictly limiting the ability of lawyers to advertise and directly seek clients. In 1908, the ABA Canons of Professional Ethics stated that the “most worthy and effective advertisement possible, even for a young lawyer … is the establishment of a well-merited reputation for professional capacity and fidelity to trust.”
The rules allowed for business cards but little else when it came to advertising.
In 1977, the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in on the knotty issue of regulating lawyer marketing, finding in Bates v. State Bar of Arizona that a lawyer has a First Amendment right to advertise. The high court recognized that advertising should be protected commercial speech, but also that states had an interest in ensuring lawyer claims weren’t misleading or false.
The decision is considered a pivot point in allowing lawyers to explore a variety of marketing strategies, Stevenson says.
Rule 7.3 of the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct prohibits lawyers from using live in-person contact to solicit clients when the “significant motive” is financial gain.
There are exceptions to the ban on in-person solicitation written into the rule, such as when the potential client is a lawyer, a family member or close friend, someone with whom there is a preexisting business or professional relationship, or a person who routinely uses for business the type of legal services being offered.
Rule 7.3 also prohibits solicitation efforts that use coercion, duress or harassment.
While most states have a version of Rule 7.3, versions can differ in interpretation and enforcement. Also, states can have other laws on the books aimed at solicitation, sometimes under the civil or even criminal code, Stevenson says.
In general, states vary in whether they have waiting periods to keep lawyers from immediately soliciting clients after a natural disaster or what’s called a “specific event,” such as an accident. For instance, Florida has a 30-day restriction on direct-mail solicitation for accident victims that was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1995. And the federal Aviation Disaster Family Assistance Act of 1996, along with later amendments, creates a 45-day waiting period after a plane crash during which lawyers are prohibited from any unsolicited contact with victims or their families.
Stevenson says the differences between states when it comes to regulation of lawyer solicitation can reflect the history and culture of an area.
He says in Texas, there’s a “strong cultural value of vigilante justice” that could account for a state law providing “bounty” for reporting lawyers who are improperly soliciting clients. Under Texas law, a person who was solicited as a client by a lawyer violating criminal barratry laws or professional conduct rules can get a $10,000 penalty payment from the lawyer.
Texas regulates solicitation from out-of-state lawyers, but there’s also a lack of cohesion when it comes to enforcement, according to Stevenson.
In addition, sometimes states relax their out-of-state solicitation rules when there’s a crisis and a “concern about access to justice,” he says.
There have been a few times after storms “where Texas lawyers have had to relocate, sometimes out of state for a while, and they don’t want them to worry so much that they don’t help the people that need it,” he adds.
Virginia allows for more extensive solicitation based on the “totality of the circumstances,” which includes the potential client’s emotional state and level of sophistication.
Hawaii, meanwhile, “tends to protect its legal community from incursions from out-of-state lawyers who may not appreciate the long-standing community, customs and culture,” Stevenson says.
“ Most lawyers are genuinely trying to do the right thing, but they are often operating in what seems to be a gray area.”
The Hawaii Office of Disciplinary Counsel, an arm of the Hawaii Supreme Court, pursued lawyers violating solicitation rules after wildfires destroyed parts of Maui in August 2023. The fire began Aug. 8, and 102 people were killed in Lahaina, a resort town.
By Aug. 14, Bradley R. Tamm, chief disciplinary counsel at the time, sounded the alarm about lawyers not licensed in Hawaii seeking to exploit victims. “Fast-moving disasters tempt opportunistic actors to prey on people when they are most vulnerable,” Tamm said in a press release.
The Hawaii Office of Disciplinary Counsel zeroed in on Eric Dick, a Houston attorney who sent flyers soliciting fire victims. The flyers included a contract and instructions to sign and return it via text message, along with the message “you may be entitled to money.”
Dick was charged with multiple counts of unauthorized practice of law, and in July 2025, a Maui judge refused to dismiss the case. In an email to the ABA Journal, Dick said the advertisements said he was “licensed in Texas,” meaning not anywhere else.
“Demonizing a mainlander attorney for truthful interstate advertising violates the very purpose of the ‘dormant’ commerce clause—ensuring states can’t block out-of-state lawyers or deny clients their right to choose counsel across state lines,” he told the ABA Journal.
In December, Dick pled no contest to unauthorized practice of law and attempted unauthorized practice. He was sentenced to pay $220 to the Crime Victims Compensation fund.
“We firmly believe that the charges were not only frivolous but symptomatic of a deeply corrupt environment,” Dick said in a statement to the ABA Journal. “Our decision to enter into a deal was purely an economic choice to expedite the dismissal of these groundless claims.”
In 2022, the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility released a formal opinion intended to clarify the Model Rules regarding soliciting clients. The guidance addressed “ambiguity” as to lawyers’ responsibilities when others solicit clients on their behalf. Formal Opinion 501 states that a lawyer “cannot do through another person that which the lawyer could not do directly.” However, to be culpable for misconduct, the lawyer “must knowingly permit, ask, direct or encourage someone to solicit on the lawyer’s behalf.”
Some states have found solicitation by nonlawyers to be more of an issue than other states and more aggressively restrict it and enforce the rules.
In Florida, a lawyer can face prosecution for improperly soliciting a client. Brian Tannebaum, a Miami ethics lawyer, says there’s a concern in the state about contracting companies soliciting clients for lawyers after storms. The scenario, he says, is when a roofing contractor is going through a neighborhood talking to people about the damage to their homes. The contractor then suggests a particular lawyer to contact, perhaps even giving out the lawyer’s card.
“It’s always permissible for anybody to suggest a lawyer,” Tannebaum says. But if the person is directly soliciting for the law firm, that’s a violation of the ethics rules.”
Regulators may look for evidence that the law firm is paying the company for each client referred, he adds.
Debra J. Davis, a partner at Smith, Tozian, Daniel & Davis in Tampa, Florida, has spent her career focused on legal ethics. Davis says “there’s nothing wrong with a roofing company making a referral, but it should be in response to a question from a customer or potential customer.”
Particularly problematic, Davis says, is if a contractor or roofer just happens to have copies of a single lawyer or law firm’s fee agreement. Lawyers in Florida and elsewhere “have to be proactive to make sure someone isn’t out there soliciting on their behalf,” she adds.
After the 2025 fires in Los Angeles, town hall meetings popped up throughout the area. At the meetings, lawyers discussed with attendees their legal rights and options.
Town halls can have their place, ethics lawyers say, but attorneys need to be on their best behavior.
Catherine Ongiri is the program director for the State Bar of California’s Office of Professional Competence. The agency sent out a reminder that town halls can be informational sessions, but that there should be “no pressure at these events” to get victims to sign up for representation. Meetings, she says, can’t cross the line into a “sales pitch.”
Steve Lopez, a partner at Gibbs Mura; and Amanda L. Riddle, a partner at Corey, Luzaich, de Ghetaldi & Riddle, represent homeowners and residents who lost their housing in the fire that started near Eaton Canyon. The lawsuit is against Southern California Edison.
They both have experience representing fire survivors. Within a week of the California wildfires, Riddle was one of the presenters at a Beverly Hills Bar Association webinar to help victims with their property damage claims. The Association for Bar Professionals and LexisNexis gave the bar group an award for its community outreach efforts in the webinar.
Lopez and Riddle held webinars and eventually town halls at the Hilton Pasadena to provide information to fire victims. While they ended up getting clients through these efforts, they said it’s important to focus on helping the community as the main priority in the aftermath of a natural disaster.
“Don’t have boots on the ground right away,” Lopez says. “Don’t show up at a disaster relief center with a T-shirt with your firm’s name on it.”
Both lawyers say that in the immediate aftermath of a fire, victims are overwhelmed with practical issues, such as finding temporary housing and food, and lawyers can help with their initial needs for basic survival.
Webinars, Riddle says, allow people who are interested in help to hear what you have to say and choose without pressure whether they want you to represent them later in litigation.
Majchrzak emphasizes that lawyers need to be careful that they don’t use advertising for their town halls to improperly solicit new clients.
“How are you getting people to the town hall meeting?” Majchrzak asks. “Are you papering the area with flyers? Are you telling passersby, ‘We are having a town hall meeting. Why don’t you stop by?’ Or are you doing something that comes closer to proscribed live solicitation, such as inviting people to an in-person opportunity to meet with counsel who could potentially represent them?”
Regulators, he says, will look at the tone of any advertisements or marketing for the town hall, along with whether victims were approached at the time of the event to sign up for legal services.
“The details matter,” he says.
