Plagiarism as Vice or Virtue

plagiarize (play-jə-rĪz) vb. (17c) To take phrases, sentences, or ideas from someone else’s work and use them in one’s own work without attribution, as if they were one’s own; to use the ideas and expressions of someone else without giving due credit. — plagiarism, n. — plagiarist, n[1]

Some argue that competent plagiarism of legal briefs is not a vice, and perhaps has its virtues.[2] Among other reasons, the argument goes, competent plagiarism saves time and money[3] (which will presumably benefit the client).[4] Thus, competent plagiarism may allow those of more limited means to afford legal representation that they might not otherwise be able to afford.[5] Further, competent plagiarism does no harm to the courts or to the original authors of the plagiarized work.[6]

Courts have not adopted this view. Instead, courts look harshly upon plagiarism (whether competent or incompetent) and consider it a form of dishonesty that, at the very least, violates Rule of Professional Conduct 8.4(c),[7] as two recent cases demonstrate.

In Vallejo v. The Neil Jones Food Co.,[8] the defendant’s motion to dismiss included “whole sections” that “were lifted verbatim, without citation or attribution, from a motion in a different case, on behalf of a different defendant, represented by a different firm, and different attorneys.”[9] The court compared the two motions and concluded the defendant’s brief included “at least a dozen paragraphs that [were] substantively identical and near word-for-word duplicates of the original . . . brief.”[10]

In another case, San Juan, Puerto Rico, sued several oil industry defendants.[11] A year before, a group of about forty other Puerto Rico municipalities filed a putative class action against the same defendants alleging the same claims.[12] The defendants filed several motions to dismiss, and San Juan’s counsel filed untimely oppositions.[13] The defendants accused San Juan’s counsel of plagiarizing materials from the putative class action.[14] The court noted that “San Juan’s 241-page complaint is almost a carbon copy of the original complaint filed a year before in the Municipalities’ Case by different, unrelated counsel.”[15] San Juan’s counsel also filed a motion for leave to file omnibus oppositions, an omnibus opposition to a motion requesting judicial notice, oppositions to the motions to dismiss, and a racketeering case statement.[16] The court concluded that all of these were plagiarized from the Municipalities’ Case.[17]

The court in each case noted the lack of care of the attorneys, even in plagiarizing. The court in Vallejo noted, “The most glaring sign of Defendant’s sweeping copy and paste from the . . . brief is on the first page of Defendant’s motion; instead of referencing the Plaintiffs in the instant case, Defendant asks the Court to dismiss the complaint of ‘Plaintiff Freddy Gutierrez,’” who was the plaintiff in the other case.[18] The court also noted that counsel had plagiarized a losing brief:

Finally, while plagiarism is patently unacceptable, it is mystifying why a party would double-down on imprudence by reproducing a losing brief. Here, Defendant copied from a motion to dismiss that was denied after being opposed two years ago by Gutierrez’s counsel—the very same attorneys and firm who represent Plaintiffs in the instant action.[19]

The court in the San Juan case noted that the complaint contained class action allegations, but the case was not a class action.[20] The plagiarized brief in opposition suffered the same error.[21]

Both courts found that counsel had engaged in professional misconduct by plagiarizing materials from another case. The Vallejo court issued an order to show cause and said,

As noted above, plagiarism, including in briefs filed with the court, is unacceptable. see Odom v. Syracuse City Sch. Dist., No. 519CV835TJMATB, 2020 WL 1689879, at *8 (N.D.N.Y. Apr. 7, 2020) (“Passing off another’s ideas as one’s own is unacceptable in a first-year college class, and can lead to failing grade or even expulsion. Doing so while engaged in the professional practice of law is worse, and is both feckless and embarrassing.”). The failure to credit another for their work product is an issue the Court takes seriously.[22]

The San Juan court also cited Odom and said:

The touchstone of plagiarism is lack of attribution. As in law school, passing someone else’s work off as one’s own is wrong as a matter of fact and professional ethics. See Odom v. Syracuse City Sch. Dist., No. 519CV835TJMATB, 2020 WL 1689879, at *8 (N.D.N.Y. Apr. 7, 2020) (“Passing off another’s ideas as one’s own is unacceptable in a first-year college class, and can lead to failing grade or even expulsion. Doing so while engaged in the professional practice of law is worse, and is both feckless and embarrassing.”). Pursuant to Model Rule 8.4(c) “[i]t is professional misconduct for a lawyer to: … engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation,” and “[t]he essence of plagiarism is deceit.” Model Rules of Pro. Conduct r. 8.4(c); Ayala v. Lockheed Martin Corp., 67 V.I. 290, 314 (Super. Ct. 2017) (quoting In re Lamberis, 443 N.E.2d 549, 552 (Ill. 1982)).  . . . Court have also called out the copy-pasting of briefs in one case for use in another without due care to adapt the same to the circumstances of the case.

* * *

The Court finds that this conduct runs afoul not only of Attorney Efron’s duty of competence to his client, but also his duty of candor to the Court. See Model Rules of Pro. Conduct r. 8.4(c) (“It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to: … engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation”). To be clear, the misconduct here is not merely following a legal theory used by other parties or attorneys in another case. Neither is this an instance of using a template or a standard form document. The misconduct is taking another lawyer’s work for a different client, filing it verbatim in this case—apparently without due review or regard for the client’s specific circumstances—and on top of all that, doing so without attribution. All of this taken together amounts to misconduct.[23]

While these cases involved incompetent plagiarism, courts have also sanctioned lawyers for competent plagiarism, i.e., plagiarism that properly advances the client’s interest, as Professor Carter notes.[24]

A bankruptcy attorney received a public reprimand for filing an opening and reply brief that were largely copied from other sources.[25] The opening brief contained nineteen pages of analysis, but seventeen pages had been copied from an article.[26] The bankruptcy judge became suspicious because the briefs were of unusually high quality.[27] The bankruptcy court issued an order requiring the attorney to certify that he was the author of the briefs.[28] The attorney filed a response, “indicating that both briefs were his sole responsibility and that they ‘relied heavily’ upon an article entitled Why Professionals Must be Interested in ‘Disinterestedness’ Under the Bankruptcy Code by William H. Schrag and Mark C. Haut.”[29] The court found that the attorney had engaged in conduct that involved dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation when he submitted briefs that plagiarized other sources.[30] So even plagiarism that produces unusually high-quality work may subject a lawyer to sanctions.

But let’s return to where we began. Plagiarism is taking phrases, sentences, or ideas from someone else’s work and using them in one’s own work without attribution.[31] Lack of attribution is the key element of plagiarism, not the taking. It is easy enough (though often tedious) to provide attribution. So, the efficiency of competent reuse, of other’s work can be preserved, and charges of plagiarism avoided, by providing proper attribution.

[1] PLAGIARIZE, Black’s Law Dictionary (12th ed. 2024).

[2] E.g., Andrew M. Carter, The Case for Plagiarism, 9 UC Irvine L. Rev. 531, 554 (2019).

[3] Id.

[4] But attorneys have been sanctioned for plagiarizing briefs and failing to pass the savings along to the client. Columbus Bar Assoc. v. Farmer, 855 N.E.2d 462 (2006).

[5] Carter, The Case for Plagiarism, 9 UC Irvine L. Rev. at 554.

[6] Id.

[7] “It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to engage in any conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation.” MISCONDUCT, MRPC Rule 8.4(c).

[8] No. 24-CV-06835-NW, 2025 WL 1684893, at *2 (N.D. Cal. June 16, 2025).

[9] Id. at *2.

[10] Id.

[11] Municipality of San Juan, Puerto Rico v. Exxon Mobil Corp., No. CV 23-1608 (ADC), 2025 WL 1065101, at *1 (D.P.R. Apr. 9, 2025).

[12] Id.

[13] Id.

[14] Id. at *6.

[15] Id.

[16] Id. at *7-8.

[17] Id. At *8-9.

[18] Vallejo, 2025 WL 1684893, at *2.

[19] Id.

[20] Municipality of San Juan, Puerto Rico, 2025 WL 1065101, at *7.

[21] Id. at *8.

[22] Vallejo, 2025 WL 1684893, at *3.

[23] Municipality of San Juan, Puerto, 2025 WL 1065101, at *9–10 (internal footnotes and accompanying citations omitted).

[24] Carter, The Case for Plagiarism, 9 UC Irvine L. Rev. at 532.

[25] Iowa S. Ct. Atty. Disc. Bd. v. Cannon, 789 N.W.2d 756 (Iowa 2010)

[26] Id. at 758.

[27] Id. at 757.

[28] Id.

[29] Id. at 758.

[30] Id.

[31] PLAGIARIZE, Black’s Law Dictionary (12th ed. 2024).