The lawyer you choose may be one of the most important factors in determining the success or failure of your case. Such a decision should be made with care. Unfortunately, choosing a lawyer can be intimidating for people who have never been through the claims process. You may be justifiably concerned about ending up with a lawyer with bad ethics or poor skills. Here are some pointers to ease those fears and provide a basic guide to finding a reputable personal injury lawyer.
The first thing to consider is that lawyers, much like doctors, often concentrate their practices in a specific area of the law. If you need hip replacement surgery, you probably want to see an orthopedic surgeon, not a cardiologist. You may also want that surgeon to routinely perform hip surgery on other patients instead of doing the procedure a few times per year.
Similarly, if you are in an accident, you will not want to hire a lawyer who focuses on divorce or real estate or business law. Similarly, you probably don’t want a lawyer who just does a few personal injury cases a month or in a given year along with other types of cases.
Although a non-specialist lawyer may be able to help you, he or she will likely not have the same experience and skills that a lawyer who specializes in personal injury law day in and day out. No one person can do it all. The same is true for lawyers who specialize in a particular practice area.
A lawyer who specializes in personal injury law will likely understand the individual nuances in the legal, procedural and evidentiary areas that come with representing accident victims. And believe me, there are many “nuances” in the field of personal injury law. They may deal with questions concerning insurance coverage, subrogation claims, medical expertise, proving the injury in question, proving the amount of damages, procedural traps, and a host of many other issues that may arise in the typical personal injury claim.
The personal injury specialist will also better understand and implement the successful strategies, arguments, and tactics that can maximize the value of your personal injury claim, because they work with these issues every day.
At Davis Law Group, we find that most of our clients come to us after a recommendation from someone they know who has used us in the past. For this reason, you may want to begin the search by talking to family and friends. Ask if anyone can refer you to a personal injury lawyer who helped them get good results, or who they have heard good things about.
You can also do your own research to find a lawyer. The internet is a good place to start. Some very reputable personal injury lawyers provide substantial information on personal injury claims and the law on their websites. Sometimes the lawyer’s successful cases are reported in the press and may show up on news feeds or in newspaper stories. Sometimes the lawyer may be featured on news stations or other programs as a credible source the media turns to for information about personal injury matters. If that’s true, that lawyer may be a good choice.
More and more lawyers are using video on the internet. This may be a good source to check out a lawyer. Look for a lawyer who actually offers helpful information about the type of case or injury you may have. Stay away from those lawyers who only brag how good they are, or how successful they have been in the past. Although success is certainly important for obvious reasons, the lawyer’s video should do more than just brag, it should actually help the potential client understand his or her rights or some potential problem that often arises in personal injury cases.
There are some lawyers who advertise heavily on TV and in the phone book. Although this may be a good place to start your search, I would not rely entirely on a lawyer’s TV or yellow page ad. Sometimes the lawyer who advertises heavily on TV or in the phone book will operate a volume injury law practice that relies heavily on the quick settlement of cases. That may not be in your best interest because often times a case requires a tremendous amount of work before a good settlement can be achieved.
There are also companies that run TV commercials where the lawyer pays to be the “next lawyer” on the referral list. Any lawyer can pay to be on the referral list so that lawyer may not necessarily be the best lawyer for your case. Be careful.
In the end, do your research. Go to the lawyer’s website. Review articles or books that the lawyer has written. You’ll want a lawyer who commands credibility, in and outside the courtroom. You’ll want a lawyer who has been successfully representing injury or accident victims for several years, not someone who’s only been testing the waters for a few years. After all, you don’t want to be the “test case” for a lawyer who is still learning.
