Professor Michael Kagan Publishes Casebook on Legal Ethics and Article on Immigration Law Reform

Professor Kagan recently co-authored a first-edition casebook on legal ethics. With Michael P. Maslanka and Nancy Ann Dao, Experiencing Professional Responsibility is a traditional legal casebook that takes on new, modern ethical issues. Of his first casebook, Professor Kagan said he was glad to be a part of it “as students struggle more with legal ethics than one would expect.” He also states that even licensed attorneys and judges sometimes labor on the topic.

“We think of legal ethics coming from bad intentions—although most times, it is from good intentions—and as a result, both students and lawyers forget some of the rules and obligations.” Professor Kagan points to the inclusion of newer issues like marketing and social media influencers in the casebook that did not exist when he was in law school. “Legal ethics is covered by the news media daily, and we selected colorful, although not the most well-known cases for the casebook for an updated approach.”

He is also publishing a new UC Irvine Law Journal article entitled Mass Surrender in Immigration Court. “This work was a study of something that has puzzled and bothered me ever since I was a law student in the late 1990s.” After going to immigration court in Detroit, Professor Kagan questioned why attorneys defending people against deportation typically concede to the government and deport people. This prompted research and study, to which Professor Kagan concludes, “ The standard of practice should change where lawyers by default should make the prosecution prove its case.”