Online aid no substitute for a lawyer, State Bar says

RALEIGH -- With a click of his mouse, Joe Bruno thought he was ending his marriage.

The video store manager had turned to the Yellow Pages looking for an attorney and seen a listing for an online company offering divorce help.

Only $600, and he'd be done.

But when he marched into the Gaston County Courthouse, the divorce filings prepared by Law Online Inc. in hand, he was instead met with laughter.

"It wasn't legal documents, and they wouldn't accept it," he said.

The N.C. State Bar has taken up his cause, accusing Law Online of offering legal advice without being licensed as attorneys in the state. In a lawsuit filed at the Wake County Courthouse, the Bar wants to stop Law Online from doing business in the state.

The company says it did little more than offer people a way to handle a divorce on their own and should not be singled out by the Bar, which acts as the licensing agency for the state's lawyers.

"We're equivalent to a self-help divorce for dummies," said Stephen Koehler, a Charlotte attorney representing Norman Hernick, a Law Online employee named in the lawsuit.

Koehler said the two cases cited by the bar -- Bruno's and a Greensboro woman's -- were isolated incidents where staff at Law Online helped them because of technical problems.

Law Online is based in Florida, but Hernick, the employee, lives in Canada. The Web site offers help for divorces in Canada and the United States as well as aid in U.S. bankruptcy cases.

State Bar staff believe that the company advertised in phone books across the state, including in the Triangle, using names such as "A Divorce Fast" and "A World Immigration Association" and marketed itself as a legitimate alternative to hiring attorneys.

"These people are being deceived into believing that everything they do is legally sufficient and legally binding," said David Johnson, an attorney representing the State Bar. "It may be harmful to the consumer."

A fine line exists between offering legal documents for people to fill out and actually doing the work and acting as a legal adviser, Johnson said.

When a company or person offers advice, sometimes just by filling out forms for a client, the company is acting as an attorney and needs to be approved by the Bar, Johnson said. Law Online is one case out of the nearly 150 investigated each year for unauthorized practices.

But Koehler questions whether divorce lawyers are just worried about losing business to self-help programs like Law Online.

"People can do it themselves," Koehler said. "A lot of these complaints come from lawyers."

Johnson did not comment on Koehler's statement, but he did say some of the complaints come from attorneys.

Just offering legal documents isn't illegal, though.

The Internet has seen a significant increase in Web sites that offer legal information, allowing many consumers to do it themselves when it comes to handling divorces, lawsuits and other routine court cases, said Laura Gasaway, a law professor at UNC-Chapel Hill.

The legal community is growing wary of some online offerings, she said. "People are going to end up making some mistakes that end up being costly," she said.

Bruno managed to get his divorce, but by paying a lawyer $300, half of what he paid the online company.

"It wound up being less expensive," he said.

Bruno is hoping to get his $600 refunded.