Firing Your Washington Personal Injury Attorney l Seattle Accident Lawyer

Here at Davis Law Group we receive many inquiries from accident victims who want to fire their personal injury attorney and switch lawyers.  Perhaps as many as 20-25% of the calls we receive from accident victims are from those who already have a personal injury attorney, but are not satisfied with the current lawyer’s performance so far.

Whenever we receive a call from an accident victim who already has a lawyer, we always advise that person to work out any dispute or conflict with their current attorney.  Most conflicts or misunderstandings can be worked out.  It just requires both the client and the lawyer to engage in effective communication.

Unfortunately, we will often decline to represent someone who already has a lawyer for a variety of reasons.  There are some cases however where we do agree to take on the case, but only in limited circumstances.  There are unique issues and potential problems with taking over a case from another attorney.  Here are some of the issues that may be present:

1.   The client may owe a fee to the former attorney.  If a client switches or fires his or her personal injury attorney, the former lawyer may have a right to be paid for the work that has already been performed.  Sometimes the former lawyer may have a right to collect a contingency fee if a settlement offer has been made in the case and/or substantial work has been done in the case.  Each case is different.  The terms of the former lawyer’s fee agreement will also have an impact.  What this means is that the client who switches lawyers may also have to pay 2 lawyers. Sometimes Davis Law Group will absorb the prior attorney’s fee claim so the client does not have to pay two lawyers.  But sometimes not, depending on the status of the case and what work is necessary to adequately represent the client’s interest.

2.   A mistake was made in the case.  Many times the client who wants to fire his or her attorney is due to some mistake that attorney has made in the case.  Sometimes this mistake makes it extremely difficult for me to rectify or solve.  Sometimes the mistake can be solved, but at a significant cost to the client.  Often times if the mistake is significant, then I will usually decline to take over. Other attorneys may feel differently so I encourage this person to contact other lawyers.

3.   The case is too far along in the process.  Sometimes the client wants to switch attorneys after too much time has elapsed or the case has worked its way through a substantial part of the claims or litigation process.  For instance, I will usually decline a case that has been litigated for a substantial period of time and the trial date is just a few months away.  In those cases I may not have sufficient time to work the case up in a fashion that I know will produce a good result.  In other occasions the important deadlines in the case may have already passed (like witness list and discovery deadlines) so my job would be extremely difficult to take over at such a late stage.  Again, I have to judge each case separately and decide whether I can actually help this person.

4.   The client may have unreasonable expectations.  Sometimes the person who calls and wants to fire his or her current attorney has unreasonable expectations on what can be achieved in their case.  Perhaps the person is unsatisfied with how long the process is taking.  Unfortunately, the legal process or the rules that apply to the case are often outside the control of the attorney.  If the quickest trial date I can get is 2 years away, that is something outside my control.  Perhaps the client is upset with the attorney’s evaluation of the case, or how much the case is worth.  I may have a similar or identical evaluation of the case so I may tell the person that their current lawyer has properly evaluated his or her claim.  There are no hard and fast rules here, but I can usually tell within the first 10 minutes or so whether the person has unreasonable expectations.  In those situations I advise the client to stick with his or her current lawyer.

5.   The case may have little or no merit.  In some cases the client’s case may not have been strong to begin with.  There are many personal injury attorneys who make promises to their clients when the case is already weak.  Perhaps the case is weak because certain evidence is missing, or the law may not recognize the type of case being pursued.  Sometimes there may be other proof problems, like proving negligence or causation.  Most of the time I would not have accepted the case to begin with, so I usually tell the person to stick with his or her lawyer.  Perhaps the current lawyer knows something about the case that I do not.

We don’t reject every client that wants to terminate their current lawyer.  Many times there are problems due to the lawyer.  Perhaps the lawyer doesn’t communicate very well with the client, or perhaps the lawyer has not evaluated the case properly, or has actually not done the necessary work to achieve the best result.  In many of these cases we will agree to take over the case, as long as we believe there is no chance that the client will be able to work out the conflict that exists with the current lawyer.  Again, each case different.

We at Davis Law Group are highly selective about the cases we accept.  We would certainly like to help everyone, but our resources are limited just like every other law firm out there.  If we believe we can successfully take over the case from your current or former lawyer, we will do so as long as the case meets our selection criteria.

I always advise people that they can avoid the problem of having to switch lawyers by taking the effort to find the best attorney for them in the beginning.  Do some research.  Choose a lawyer that specializes in the type of case you have.