 | This article may be too technical for most readers to understand. (March 2021) |
A paralegal, also known as a legal assistant, or paralegal specialist is a legal professional who performs tasks that require knowledge of legal concepts but not the full expertise of a lawyer with an admission to practice law. The market for paralegals is broad, including consultancies, companies that have legal departments or that perform legislative and regulatory compliance activities in areas such as environment, labor, intellectual property, zoning, and tax. Legal offices and public bodies also have many paralegals in support activities using other titles outside of the standard titles used in the profession.[citation needed] There is a diverse array of work experiences attainable within the paralegal (legal assistance) field, ranging between internship, entry-level, associate, junior, mid-senior, and senior level positions.
In the United States in 1967, the American Bar Association (ABA) endorsed the concept of the paralegal and, in 1968, established its first committee on legal assistants. In 2018, the ABA amended their definition of paralegal removing the reference to legal assistants. The current definition reads as follows, "A paralegal is a person, qualified by education, training, or work experience who is employed or retained by a lawyer, law office, corporation, governmental agency or other entity and who performs specifically delegated substantive legal work for which a lawyer is responsible."
The exact nature of their work and limitations that the law places on the tasks that they are allowed to perform vary between nations and jurisdictions. Paralegals generally are not allowed to offer legal services independently in most jurisdictions. In some jurisdictions, paralegals can conduct their own business and provide services such as settlements, court filings, legal research and other auxiliary legal services; these tasks often have instructions from a solicitor attached.
Recently, some US and Canadian jurisdictions have begun creating a new profession where experienced paralegals are being licensed, with or without attorney supervision, to allow limited scope of practice in high need practice areas such as family law, bankruptcy and landlord-tenant law in an effort to combat the access to justice crisis. The education, experience, testing, and scope of practice requirements vary widely across the various jurisdictions. So too are the number of titles jurisdictions are using for these new practitioners, including Limited License Legal Technician, Licensed Paralegals, Licensed Paraprofessionals, Limited Licensed Paralegals, Limited License Paraprofessionals, Allied Legal Professionals, etc.
In the United States, a paralegal is protected from some forms of professional liability under the theory that paralegals are working as an enhancement of an attorney, who takes ultimate responsibility for the supervision of the paralegal's work and work product. Paralegals often have taken a prescribed series of courses in law and legal processes. Paralegals may analyze and summarize depositions, prepare and answer interrogatories, draft procedural motions and other routine briefs, perform legal research and analysis, legislative assistance (legislative research), draft research memos, and perform some quasi-secretarial or legal secretarial duties, as well as perform case and project management. Paralegals often handle drafting much of the paperwork in probate cases, divorce actions, bankruptcies, and investigations. Consumers of legal services are typically billed for the time paralegals spend on their cases. In the United States, they are not authorized by the government or other agency to offer legal services (including legal advice) except in some cases in Washington State (through LLLT designation) in the same way as lawyers, nor are they officers of the court, nor are they usually subject to government-sanctioned or court-sanctioned rules of conduct. In some jurisdictions (Ontario, Canada, for example) paralegals are licensed and regulated the same way that lawyers are and these licensed professionals may be permitted to provide legal services to the public and appear before certain lower courts and administrative tribunals.