Court Opinion

ID: 9724004
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:40:53.473965+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:54.174277
License: Public Domain

Taylor, P.J.
(dissenting). The majority adopts the position that it is appropriate to make a judicial finding that there was a conflict of interest inherent in representation of both plaintiff police officers and the City of Detroit by an attorney from the office of the Detroit corporation counsel. In taking this position, the majority relies upon the Michigan Rules of Professional Conduct to establish that there was, in fact, a conflict of interest. I disagree with the majority’s analysis on the grounds that there was no jurisdiction for the trial court to hear this matter and that, if there was a conflict of interest, it was waived by the plaintiffs.
MRPC 1.0(b) specifically disclaims the creation of a cause of action based on its provisions:
The rules do not, however, give rise to a cause of action for enforcement of a rule or for damages caused by failure to comply with an obligation or prohibition imposed by a rule. In a civil or criminal action, the admissibility of the Rules of Professional Conduct is governed by the Michigan Rules of Evidence and other provisions of law.
There is then no jurisdiction for plaintiffs’ cause of action based on the mrpc. This is reinforced in the comment to MRPC 1.13 as follows:
Governmental Agency
The duty defined in this rule applies to governmental organizations. However, when the client is *211a governmental organization, a different balance may be appropriate between maintaining confidentiality and assuring that the wrongful official act is prevented or rectified because public business is involved. In addition, duties of lawyers employed by the government or lawyers in military service may be defined by statutes and regulations. Therefore, defining precisely the identity of the client and prescribing the resulting obligations of such lawyers may be more difficult in the government context. In some circumstances, it may be a specific agency, but in others it may be the government as a whole. For example, if the action or failure to act involves the head of a bureau, the department of which the bureau is a part may be the client for purpose of this rule. With these qualifications, the lawyer’s substantive duty to the client and reasonable courses of action are essentially the same as when the client is a private organization.
This limitation in the use of the mrpc is never addressed by the majority. Further, in none of the cases cited does a court review a conflict of interest except where a claim of conflict is raised in an existing lawsuit by the opposing party. There simply are no cases of which I am aware, nor I assume of which the majority is aware, where a party seeks conflict relief concerning the party’s own lawyer. That person’s remedy is to discharge the attorney, bring a grievance, or, perhaps, sue for malpractice.
Even if there is a conflict of interest over which the trial court could take jurisdiction, under MRPC 1.7(b)(2), a client can consent, after being made aware of a potential conflict, to representation by the lawyer having the potential conflict of interest. Indeed, MRPC 1.13(e) expressly anticipates dual representation, and, as the above com*212ments make clear, greater latitude is allowed for government lawyers engaged in such representation. It is my view that plaintiffs must be held to have consented or waived the conflict pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement entered into by the union in this matter.
Detroit Charter, § 6-403, and Detroit Code, art XI, §§ 13-11-1, 13-11-2, 13-11-3, 13-11-4, and 13-11-5, as quoted by the majority, outline the various ordinances providing for the method of representing an employee who is sued while simultaneously determining whether the city should cover that person, i.e., whether the incident for which the employee is being sued arises out of or involves the performance in good faith of the official duties of the officer or employee. In this regard, § 28 of the collective bargaining agreement says:
The city will continue to defend and indemnify employees in accordance with Section 13-11-3 of the 1984 municipal code and all practices and procedures related thereto, in effect July 1, 1977, except that such defense and indemnification is mandatory upon a ñnding that the claim, demand or suit against the employee arises out of or involves the performance in good faith of the official duties of the employee. A contrary determination by the city council is not ffnal and binding as provided by the code but is subject to review by an arbitration panel under Article 8 of this agreement. Pending a ffnal determination of whether or not the employee is entitled to defense and indemnification by the city, the city shall promptly undertake such defense on behalf of such employee. [Emphasis added.]
Here, the union entered into a contract to have done exactly what was done.1 The union did not *213specify that there would be a "Chinese wall” whereby the lawyer who was working on the defense and indemnification of plaintiff police officers would have nothing to do with the lawyer who was working on the presentation to the city council. Rather, they simply took the ordinance and method of handling such matters in effect on July 1, 1977, and continued that method. If conflict problems were handled by the same procedure in 1977, a question I would remand to decide, then the union contract controls and bars relief for plaintiffs.
This is so because an employee is bound by the contract that his union has negotiated for him. Farmington Hills v Farmington Hills Police Officers Ass’n, 79 Mich App 581, 589; 262 NW2d 866 (1977), holds that the public employee relations act (pera), MCL 423.201 et seq.; MSA 17.455(1) et seq., accords broad bargaining authority to the designated representative of the police officers. Further, our Michigan courts have held that the pera should be interpreted consistently with the National Labor Relations Act (nlra), 29 USC 151 et seq., noting that federal case law interpreting the nlra broadly construes the designated representative’s authority.
The statute [29 USC 159] contemplates the making of agreements by representatives of the employees, not by the employees themselves, giving "statutory approval to the philosophy of bargaining as worked out in the labor movement in the United States.” [NLRB v Darlington Veneer Co, 236 F2d 85, 89 (CA 4, 1956), quoted in Farmington Hills, supra, p 590.]
*214Congress has given unions wide authority and great discretion to reconcile the competing interests of the employees whom they represent so that they might speak with one voice when they confront management at the bargaining table. . . . Congressional validation of collective action, however, necessarily involves extinguishing many of the contract and economic rights belonging to union members and, instead, vesting the power to act in their behalf with their chosen representative, the union. [Crenshaw v Allied Chemical Corp, 387 F Supp 594, 598-600 (ED Va, 1975), quoted in Farmington Hills, supra, p 590.]
Here, the collective bargaining agreement has extinguished plaintiffs’ right to challenge the conflict in this case, and I accordingly would hold that plaintiffs are bound, just like the Farmington Hills police officers were, by the contract that their union negotiated for them.
An employee may attack a contract as being in violation of a union’s duty of fair representation. However, a union’s activities in this regard only can be held to be arbitrary, and as such to constitute a breach of the duty of fair representation, if the union’s behavior is so far outside a wide range of reasonableness as to be irrational. Air Line Pilots Ass’n, Int’l v O’Neill, 499 US 65; 111 S Ct 1127; 113 L Ed 2d 51 (1991). Such a standard could not be met here.
In summary, I would hold that the trial court had no authority to hear this matter, but that, even if it did, it was bound to find that any conflict of interest was waived by the union contract (assuming, upon remand, it is determined that the procedures for handling conflicts were the same in 1977 as those exercised in this case).

 Notable here is the fact that the union, by way of negotiation, *213secured for its members additional protection over and above that afforded nonunion employees, namely an arbitration procedure if the employee lost following exhaustion of the ordinance-provided procedures.