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MA Confidential: More 1099-MISCgivings

By Michael Mooney and Jeremy Evans
December 01, 2003

[Editor's note: Law firms and their accountants have had ample justification for grousing about the convoluted IRS instructions for determining if damages paid to clients are taxable - and therefore reportable on form 1099-MISC. Our August article on the subject clarified those instructions, and then promised future attention to a related issue: whether filing a 1099-MISC form without client consent violates a lawyer's professional ethical duty not to disclose client confidences.
 We now fulfill that promise, with much appreciated assistance from Boston firm Nutter, McClennen & Fish, LLP. Managing Partner Mike Mooney (a member of our Editorial Board) and his colleague Jeremy Evans explain for us their approach to answering this surprisingly complex question.]

Does filing a 1099-MISC form without client consent violate a lawyer's professional ethical duty not to disclose client confidences? Absent such consent, how should a lawyer proceed? Using the example of our own state, Massachusetts, we illustrate in this article the analysis required to answer that question.

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