The Good Wife Has A Conflict of Interest

In the season finale on The Good Wife, The Dream Team, the writers went completely off their rockers. They had the firm file a multi-million dollar class action lawsuit with multiple plaintiffs. The firm wins a $25 million judgment. Huzzah! But then it all goes terribly awry.

Two regular nemeses of the firm (played by Michael J. Fox and Martha Plimpton) team up and sue the firm. They say the firm must have bribed the judge or done something wrong. They ask the firm to drop the class action suit and they say they’ll then drop the suit against the firm. The firm says no. Later, the firm changes its mind and agrees to drop the class action if the lawyers will drop the suit against the firm. Fortunately, they say the deal is off the table.

Hello? Anybody home? If the writers wanted to end the show and have the firm shut down in disgrace, they could let the firm make this offer. Otherwise, it’s a non-starter.

The firm has a duty to act in the best interests of its clients. It can’t dismiss a suit without client permission. It can’t dismiss a suit because the dismissal benefits the firm. It can never, ever, act against the interests of the client.

This plot device was so colossally stupid I almost didn’t make it through the episode. Fortunately, they didn’t have the double-dealing dismissal actually go through.

How could they have made the plot as interesting without sacrificing any sense of real world attorney ethics? How about having the clients offer to dismiss their suit to save their beloved lawyers? Okay, I’ll try to stop laughing. What about having the firm notify their malpractice carrier about yet another suit, and have the insurance lawyers try to double-deal the firm? If their carrier hasn’t dropped them by now, it should. Maybe next season.

While we’re at it, can we all promise to stop having depositions and hearings happen the day after the suit is filed? No? Puh-leeze. I can’t get a hearing on even the smallest issue for at least 2- 3 weeks. I’d love to see shows that actually use the delays to help create tension in the show. But that’s a blog post for another day.

C’mon, Good Wife writers. I’m a lawyer and a fan. Try not to make me throw things at the TV. I’ll be watching in the fall. You have plenty of time over the break to catch up on your research.