Sarasota Injury Law Blog

What kind of attorney should I hire for my Sarasota Bradenton auto accident or slip and fall accident? Too many people think that hiring an injury attorney is like hiring a plumber, just look in the yellow pages or do an online yellow pages or “google” search and pick one. After all, they all went to law school, and they have a law degree and a license to practice. But more importantly, what is their training and experience, and do they handle a large volume of clients or a small number? Attorneys are just like any other business, in that some are set up to be a factory of mass production, or mill as we lawyers call them. And at the opposite spectrum are attorneys who handle only a small number of cases so that they can produce a better quality case or outcome.

When attorneys take a large number of cases they reach a point where they have to hire a case manager or paralegal to do every task on the case, except for filing suit and going to court. Now, there is nothing wrong with paralegals, but there are tasks they are trained to do, but they are not trained to be lawyers. They cannot plan, research, develop, analyze or handle a case like an attorney. Nor should they. What they do is hold down the cost of the firm to handle mass numbers of cases. They do this by leveraging the lower salary of a case manger versus an experienced attorney. It is simply a business decision or model. Often, in these busy law firms, these managers even write the settlement demand after gathering all the medical records and bills and any lost wage documentation. Of course the attorney is theoretically looking over their shoulder at times, and supposedly managing the file, but is that enough to get the best settlement in a case?

These attorneys are so busy that they can’t return phone calls timely, much less keep up with the “paper chase”. The case becomes totally dependent on a lower level law clerk who does not, and cannot, stay on top of the far too many files he or she is handling. Many times, especially in smaller cases, the medical bills and treatment far exceed what the case will ever possibly settle for so that only the lawyer and the doctors are going to get paid. You see, most times the client has to pay any unpaid medical bills out of their share of the settlement, or pay back liens to their insurance company for the bills previously paid by medical insurance. These must now be repaid from any injury settlement. It basically becomes a paper pushing business with the case manager doing all the real work.

How is it different for attorneys that limit the number of cases and focus on quality rather than quantity? Well for starters, in our firm we purposely limit the number of files to a number so that I can handle every aspect of the case from initial interview to settlement or suit and trial. I spend a great deal of time with any client that potentially has a good case on the first visit. This is so I learn as much as possible about the clients background, medical history, prior injury history, and claims history. I use a checklist of red flags to screen out all but the best of cases and clients. After all my years of defense, I can spot a winner or a loser early on. I remember all the cases I lost on defense and the reasons why. And I also remember the many that I won and the reasons why. I know which kind of cases are going to be tough for the opposing insurance company to defend from the outset, and which ones they will deny and fight forever. There is a big difference in the two. We purposely look for cases where the insurance company has a big incentive to settle. I want cases where they look for reasons to settle to get rid of the exposure or risk, rather than ones they have a laundry list of reasons to deny and defend.

Then when I decide to take a case, it is usually well worth my time to handle the case thoroughly. Otherwise, I would not be taking it to begin with. I basically micro manage every aspect of the case from initial medical care and treatment to settlement or suit, so that I am right on top of every fact and detail of the injury each step of the way from start to finish. The client becomes like a teammate, in that the lines of communication between attorney and client are frequent and clear. We have a plan. There is a strategy. Nothing happens by chance or is left to chance. We meet and talk often. It is like a game of chess, with the doctors and medical evidence being the pieces. Because I spent 17 years defending the very insurance companies I now pursue, I know the medical evidence and treatment procedures and what it takes to checkmate the insurance company. I know how they defend, so I make sure we can counter punch. Building a good case is much like producing a good movie, only the client is the actor, and I am the producer. When I take the case I can see the road to success and victory, and where the twists and turns will be. The insurance company will go here with their doctors and evidence, and I will go there with our doctors and evidence. I will take the doctors the insurance company is trying to use and turn them into doctors favorable to my client. I will take my client’s doctors and build the case showing a serious and severe injury and destroy their doctors credibility in the process. I know the medicine as well as the doctors. This only comes from experience, and the school of hard knocks. When I negotiate or deal with insurance companies, I can speak their language, having been on their side the first half of my 30 years experience.

If you have a marginal case, you can get by with the mill or factory attorney approach. But the more your case begins to have a serious or severe injury, the more you should consider hiring an attorney that limits the number of cases to manage the quality of the results or outcome. If you have broken bones with surgery and hardware implanted, or neck, knee, hip or back surgery, you should give serious consideration to finding an experienced Sarasota injury attorney that can watch over your case in progress much like a mother would look after her own new born baby. With a lot of attention to detail.

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