Translation For Lawyers

Professional certified Chinese-English and English-Chinese translation and interpretation services come in handy during arbitration. According to Article 15 of the Chinese Arbitration Law, all arbitration that takes place in China must be conducted according to Chinese law. At the outset, this requires conducting the arbitration in Chinese and, therefore, using a foreign language interpretation. Further, all evidence must either be in Chinese or include a foreign language translation. The law does include a special provision for resolving disputes between a Chinese party and a foreign investor or business. According to Article 65, this special provision applies only when the arbitration matter involves an economic, trade, transport or maritime dispute involving foreign concerns.

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We've blogged about certified legal translation and multilingual arbitration interpreting services for international arbitration. We also blogged about English-Chinese and Chinese-English legal translation services required for doing business in China. In China, an arbitration proceeding will typically not commence unless both parties have prepared all necessary documentation as required for the arbitration. Depending on which jurisdiction the proceeding is occurring in, this will likely require foreign language translations. Further, according to Article 14 of the Rules of Arbitration, all this information must be provided via the appointed application for arbitration. Once complete, the application must be submitted to the appointed commission, who will then provide notification and the necessary details.

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We've blogged about notarized and certified contract translation services for international arbitration and about multilingual arbitration proceedings interpreting. Although international arbitration may have made significant advances over the past several decades, as a whole, the rules and regulations governing attorneys in the international arbitration multi-language setting have not.

According to Catherine A. Rogers, Professor of Law at Penn State University and author of the essay The Ethics of Advocacy in International Arbitration, 'international arbitration is the wild west of ethics'. Rogers viewpoint is that due to a lack of any form of uniform rules of ethics, attorneys involved in an arbitration that spans national borders are often following very different - and sometimes conflicting - rules of ethical conduct.

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Confidentiality plays an important role not only during multilingual legal document translation, but also in the context of legal translation and legal interpretation services and multilingual e-Discovery. According to the rules of ethics, lawyers are required to keep confidential anything pertaining to the representation of a client. Further, the rule of confidentiality is specifically broader than the attorney-client privilege, which only pertains to communications between the client and his or her attorney. Of course the purpose for this rule is to encourage clients to speak openly about the case and the lawyer to provide zealous representation. But what happens when the attorney and client cannot communicate?

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We've blogged about multilingual certified legal translation services and authenticating foreign website evidence. Federal Rules of Evidence 901 and 902 govern the authentication of records. Accordingly, before a document can be admitted, the offering party must demonstrate that the document is authentic. The rules generally allow authentication to occur through the sworn testimony of a witness having knowledge or expert opinion on the document.

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We've blogged about multilingual legal translation and document review services during e-Discovery. One question often arises during international eDiscovery: Does a party producing a non-US document have a duty to provide a foreign language translation?

Although in general this is common practice, in some jurisdictions the courts have ruled that such a duty does not exist. In Grundstad v. Ritt, 1998 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 5111 at 7 (N.D. Ill. 1998), the court held that 'the producing party is not obligated to translate foreign documents into English' and that 'the documents must be produced as they currently exist, with the opposing party having to bear any cost of translation if necessary'.

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Professional legal translation services by expert legal translators are vital for international litigation. In an international dispute, often times one party will seek judicial notice of a foreign law. However, every jurisdiction has its own definition and requirements of judicial notice that must be followed. To ensure that all requirements are met and judicial notice is properly preserved, the first step is to understand the foreign law, which requires a foreign language translation.

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Professional certified legal translation services and multilingual legal translations play an important role for gaming and casino industry. Countries, states and regions all have particular laws that either prohibit or restrict gambling. However, with the growing popularity of online gambling - which may allow a player residing in a jurisdiction with gambling restrictions to gamble 'within' a gambling-friendly jurisdiction - the question of how to apply prohibitions and restrictions becomes unclear. Yet, such legal bodies as the European Court of Justice (ECJ), US Supreme Court and such international agencies as the World Trade Organization (WTO) have each issued decisions helping to clarify this area of the law.

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We've blogged about multi-language legal translation and court interpreting services in the cases involving non-English-speaking clients' testamentary capacity and undue influence. If a parent is deceased, can creditors go after their assets in order to pay off outstanding debt? For example, can a bank holding a mortgage force a surviving child to sell a car to repay the debt?

The answer, as often is in the legal field, is 'it depends'. Essentially, if the parent's probate estate, or the assets that do not have beneficiaries named on them, are not held in trust, or are less than $100,000.00, then one can transfer title to themselves using the small estates affidavit.

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