Should Notaries be reading, reviewing, or closely perusing the documents they notarize?

Q: Should Notaries be reading, reviewing, or closely perusing the documents they notarize?
 

 

My Thought: If notaries should not be reading, reviewing, or closely perusing the documents they notarize. Then how would they know that a document is not false, deceptive, or fraudulent?

I researched this Principle of Notarization:

Code of Professional Responsibility of 2020 
Guide Principle II
Article B: Other Conflicts of Interest

This practice standard is important for a couple of reasons. First, notaries are not document police. Hence, notaries should not be reading, reviewing, or closely perusing the documents they notarize.

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26.7: Notary Best Practices.

26.7 The notary who is neither an attorney nor a professional in a law-related field should not read or review the document to be notarized. (source: Notary Best Practices: Avoiding the Notary's Unauthorized Practice of Law (UPL) pg. 415).

IV: Code of Professional Responsibility of 2020

The Notary shall not execute a false or incomplete notarial certificate, nor perform a notarial act regarding any document or transaction that the Notary believes is false, deceptive, or fraudulent. (source: Code of Professional Responsibility of 2020; Guiding Principles IV; Standards of Practice; Article E: Potentially Fraudulent documents pg. 35)

STANDARDS OF PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

Article E: Fraudulent Notarizations or Transactions

IV-E-2: Improper Document or Transaction.

The Notary shall refuse to perform any notarial act in connection with a document or transaction that the Notary knows, or has a reasonable belief that can be articulated, is illegal, dishonest, deceptive, false, or improper.

Article E: Fraudulent Notarizations or Transactions.
This Article is intended as a sweeping fraud-deterrent catch-all set of provisions, as honesty, integrity, diligence, prudence, and reasonable care are the hallmarks of the ethical Notary. Notaries, as has been observed, are on the front line of crime fighting in the war against identity theft and document fraud.

IV-E-2: Improper Document or Transaction.
This Standard expands upon Standard IV-E-2. The Standard could have permitted a notary to refuse to notarize only in circumstances in which "an instrument contains [s] a statement known by the notary public to be false." (Nev. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 240.075.2.) The 1998 Code Standard also allowed a notary to refuse if the Notary had a "reasonable suspicion." However, the drafters elected to revise the 1998 Standard to require Notaries to know, or to have more than a mere "reasonable suspicion," that the document or transaction is somehow improper. Under this revised 2020 Standard, the Notary must know or have "a reasonable belief that can be articulated" of some impropriety of the document or transaction. Not all statutes impose this heightened burden upon the Notary. (See GA Code Ann. § 45-17-8(b): "No notary shall be obligated to perform a notarial act if he feels such act is ... [f] or a transaction which the notary knows or suspects is illegal, false, or deceptive.") There are several objective grounds on which a notarization should be refused: illegality, dishonesty, deceptiveness, falsity, fraud, or impropriety.

This Standard does not direct or expect the Notary to engage in a detailed investigation for every document or transaction. Instead, the reasonable and prudent notary should employ a commonsense approach whereby irregularities apparent on the face of the document or circumstances attendant to the document or transaction raise a "red flag" suggesting that some impropriety may be afoot.

The Illustration presents a scenario of a notary who has knowledge that an affidavit is false (see Article E: Fraudulent Notarizations or Transactions; Code of Professional Responsibility of 2020, pg.35). Under these circumstances, the Notary must refuse to notarize.

By that logic above:

·         If notaries should not be reading, reviewing, or closely perusing the documents they notarize. Then how would they know that a document is not false, deceptive, or fraudulent? While it's not illegal for a notary to read a document they are notarizing, it's generally not necessary or recommended, as it could be a violation of the signer's privacy. The notary's primary duty is to verify the signer's identity and witness their signature, not to analyze the document's content.