Prof. Jim Moliterno Advises EWMI-JILEP Ethics Training Program

On February 6, EWMI-JILEP organized a roundtable discussion with the new members of the Georgian Bar Association (GBA)’s Ethics Commission.  Over the course of the last three years, EWMI-JILEP had worked with the previous Commission to help it establish an active and effective oversight and advisory mechanism.  The main purpose of the roundtable was to encourage the new members of the Commission, voted into office in December 2014, to continue the work of their predecessors.

JILEP’s lead expert in the field of legal ethics, Professor James Moliterno of Washington and Lee School of Law, Virginia, USA, attended the session and explained to the new members what steps in his estimation, the Commission needed to take to solidify the progress made thus far in establishing its ‘advisory opinion’ mechanism.  Professor Moliterno noted that by having such a mechanism, which allows bar members to receive ethics advice from the Commission in advance, the GBA can count itself ahead of many bar associations in Western Europe.  The new Chairman of the Ethics Commission, Ms. Tsitsino Tskhvediani, expressed her desire to continue the reforms begun by the previous commission.  Ms. Tskhvediani commented that she had been a member of the Commission back in in 2005 when they were pushing “a cart;” and now that they  had “a Mercedes,” they needed to learn how to drive it.