Privacy Policy

Federal law as well as the regulations of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) require law firms, like other professionals who provide personal financial services, to inform their clients about the firm’s privacy policy concerning client information.  Specifically, this notice complies with the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, Pub. Law 106-102 November 12, 1999 and the correlative Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulation, 16 CFR Part 313 (May 24, 2000).

Attorneys have always been and continue to be bound by a code of professional standards governing client confidentiality that are even more stringent than those required by this new law.  As attorneys, we have always protected our client's right to privacy and will continue to do so in the future.

In the course of providing individual clients with legal advice, we often receive a significant amount of personal information, including financial information.  As a client or future client, you should rest assured that all of the information we receive from you is held in the strictest confidence and is not released to anyone outside the firm, except as agreed to by you, or as required by law.  We retain records relating to the professional services we provide so that we are better able to assist you with your legal needs and in some cases, to comply with professional guidelines.  In order to protect your nonpublic, personal information, we maintain physical, electronic and procedural safeguards that comply with professional standards.  Should you have any questions or concerns about the firm’s privacy policy, the treatment of your personal information or the firm’s professional code of ethics, please feel free to contact us.

Limitation of Liability

We will not be liable for any damages or injury that accompanies or results from your use of our website.

These include (but are not limited to) damages or injury caused by any:

• use of (or inability to use) our website
• use of (or inability to use) any website to which you hyperlink from our website
• failure of our website to perform in the manner you expected or desired
• Error on our website
• Omission on our website
• Interruption of availability of our website
• Defect on our website
• Delay in the operation or transmission of our website
• Computer worm, virus or line failure

NOTE: We are not liable for any damages, including:

• Damages intended to compensate someone directly for a loss or injury
• Damages reasonably expected to result from a loss or injury (known in legal terms as “consequential damages”)
• Other miscellaneous damages and expenses resulting directly from a loss or injury (known in legal terms as “incidental damages.”)

We are not liable even if our agents, members or staff have been negligent; or if our authorized representative has been advised of the possibility of such damage or both.

EXCEPTION: Certain state laws may not allow us to limit or exclude liability for these “incidental” or “consequential” damages.  If you live in one of those states, the above limitation would not apply, which means you may have the right to recover these types of damages.  However, in any event, our liability to you for all losses, damages, injuries, and claims of any and every kind, whether the damages are claimed under the terms of contact, or claim to be caused by negligence or other wrongful conduct, or they are claimed under any other legal theory, will not be greater than the amount you paid us to access our website.

Copyright

All material contained in this website (herein referred to as “Online Material”) is our copyrighted property.  All trademarks, service marks and trade names are proprietary to us.  No Online Material from our website can be copied, reproduced, republished, uploaded, posted, transmitted, or distributed in any way - except that you may download one copy of the material on any single computer for your use only, provided that you:

• retain all copyright, trademark and propriety notices in the material,
• make no modifications to the material,
• do not use the material in a manner that suggests an association with any of our products, services, events or brands - without expressed written consent from us, and
• do not download quantities of materials to a database, server, or personal computer, for reuse for commercial purposes which violates our privacy policy.

The content behind our firewall is confidential and privileged information for our exclusive use.  Distribution of information is restricted to Advocatus Law Firm, PLC activities, exclusively.  Use of names of members or clients for solicitation is strictly prohibited.

You may not, however, copy, reproduce, republish, upload, post, transmit or distribute our Online Material in any way or for any other purpose, unless you first obtain our written permission.  You may not add, delete, distort or misrepresent any content on our website. Any attempt to modify any Online Material, or to defeat or circumvent our security features is prohibited.

Everything you download, any software, plus all files, all images incorporated in or generated by the software, and all data accompanying it, is considered licensed to you by us or third-party licensors for your use only.  We do not transfer title of the software to you.  We retain full and complete title to the software and to all of the associated intellectual-property rights.  Users are not allowed to redistribute or sell the material or to reverse-engineer, disassemble or otherwise convert it to any other form so it can be reused.

Links to Other Websites

We may provide referrals and links to other websites from our website.  These links should not be seen as an endorsement, approval or agreement with any information or resources offered at websites you are able to access through our website.  If you have any doubt about whether you are in our website, check the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) address provided in the address line of your web browser to verify whether you are still in our website or if you have moved to another website.

We are not responsible for the content or practices of third party websites that may be linked to our websites.  When we provide links or references to other websites, no inference or assumption should be made and no representation should be deduced that we are connected with, operate or control those websites.   Any approved link must not represent in any way, either explicitly or by implication, that you have received the endorsement, sponsorship or support of our firm, including our respective employees, agents, members or managers.

Termination of Agreement

This agreement remains in effect until terminated by either party.  You may terminate this agreement at any time, by destroying all materials obtained from our website, along with all related documentation, copies and installations and ceasing from using or working with these materials.   We may terminate this agreement at any time without notice to you or our users or members, if--in our sole judgment--you breach any term or condition of this agreement.  Upon termination, you must destroy all materials.  In addition, by providing material to us, we do not in any way promise that the materials will remain available to you, and we are entitled to terminate all or any part of any of our website without notice to you.

Jurisdiction

Advocatus Law Firm, PLC was organized under the laws of Michigan, in the United States of America.  If you use the Advocatus website from locations outside of the State of Michigan, we did not intend to contact you, and you are responsible for compliance with any applicable local laws.  These Terms of Use, and the agreement they create, shall be governed by and interpreted according to the laws of the State of Michigan.  If any provision of this agreement is unlawful, void or unenforceable, it will not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions.  We may modify these Terms of Use, and the agreement they create, at any time, simply by updating this posting and without notice to you.  This is the ENTIRE agreement regarding all the matters that have been discussed.

Suggestions and Comments

We have taken every effort to design this website to be useful, informative, helpful and accurate.  We count on the entire membership and staff of Advocatus to help accomplish this objective.  If you have suggestions for improvements or changes that would make it even easier for you to find the information you need and want, please message the web manager at the following e-mail address: webmaster@advocatuslaw.com.