FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 16, 1998
CONTACT: Dan Rene 703-847-3088
The U.S. Supreme Court decision announced yesterday in Phillips v. Washington
Legal Foundation was a major victory for individual rights and
against a program that confiscated interest from lawyers trust accounts
for clients to fund a network of activist legal services lawyers.
In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that interest from these lawyers'
trust accounts was private property. The decision was a blow to the Interest
on Lawyers Trust Account (IOLTA) programs across the country which confiscate
interest in these accounts, at amounts up to $50 per account, to fund legal
services lawyers, mainly in the controversial programs funded by the federal
Legal Services Corporation.
Legal services lawyers have stirred controversy by suing to overturn elections,
curtail absentee voting rights of military personnel and thwarting drug
evictions from public housing. In recent years they have used IOLTA fund
to litigate in cases promoting welfare for illegal aliens and to stop deportations
of illegal aliens.
Kenneth Boehm, Chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, is a leading
expert on the federal legal services program. He has testified before Congress
seven times on the subject and previously served as Counsel to the Board
of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation. He is available to discuss
the Supreme Court decision and to debate proponents of the IOLTA program
or the federal legal services program.
Boehm commented,"The organized bar set up the IOLTA scheme to confiscate
their clients interest income in attorney accounts to fund the pet political
causes of the controversial legal services program. The Supreme Court decision
correctly said that interest income is private property. This decision
is the beginning of the end for a totally indefensible program."
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