Attorney discipline spreads online

South Carolina is jumping on the bandwagon with a dozen other states that post attorney disciplinary actions on the web.

The new repository on the state bar website is intended to make it easier for the public to search the disciplinary history of a specific attorney. Although the information has always been public record, there has not been a convenient way to check an attorney's disciplinary history, said John M. Jolley, chair of the South Carolina Bar's professional responsibility committee.

Each year, the organization receives numerous questions from potential clients about whether an attorney has been disciplined, according to Bob Wells, the executive director of the South Carolina Bar.

It was the sense of the committee that the Bar had a public responsibility to make access easier, he said.

The resolution was approved by the state Bar's House of Delegates at the end of January and they plan to start compiling data for the site this month, working backwards from 2006, said Wells.