Ellen Pitluk

Ellen Eidelbach Pitluk is a legal ethics attorney offering confidential advice to lawyers wishing to comply with the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct, Texas Rules of Disciplinary Procedure, ethics opinions and case law. When she is not practicing law, Ms. Pitluk is traveling the world with her husband, Bill Dobbs, volunteering, gardening, working on various projects and generally leading a busy, satisfying life.

Prior to retiring from the State Bar of Texas in July 2024, Ms. Pitluk practiced legal ethics in the Office of the Chief Disciplinary Counsel for 17 years with one brief break as a public defender in a newly formed mental health court for misdemeanors in Bexar County (San Antonio) in 2008. This experience, along with starting a solo attorney career as a newly minted lawyer at age 43, taught Ms. Pitluk invaluable lessons about the human condition which translated well to assisting Texas attorneys on the State Bar of Texas Ethics Helpline.

While working at the State Bar, she received two presidential citations from elected State Bar presidents (2013, 2021) and a staff excellence award (April 2021) for providing preventative counsel on sticky ethics situations prior to the filing of a grievance. She has written and consulted on several CLE papers and law journal articles, and continues to speak at CLE seminars and podcasts on legal ethics. Ms. Pitluk is a member of the State Bar of Texas and the American Bar Association.