Ep 70: Finding the Right Law Firm Matters in a Catastrophic Injury Case (Part 4)

Clarke, welcome to the catastrophic comeback podcast with American injury lawyer. Clark speaks helping you find hope, purpose and joy after a catastrophic injury.

So if there are adjusters that focus more on catastrophic cases, then in our catastrophic cases, and the catastrophic cases that we work on, and we build,

my experience is we see the same adjusters and the same lawyers in these kinds of catastrophic cases, over and over and over again, and then the relationships and the credibility and the manner in which you justify your demands becomes very important.

Yeah, absolutely. I can tell you the name, I'm not going to mention here, but I can tell you the name of the catastrophic adjuster for Farm Bureau who's, you know, in the who handles the state of North Carolina in this region, because I talk to them all the time when we're doing these catastrophic cases,

and they all go to this one guy who's got a lot of experience, he's been doing this a long time. And we know each other. You know my first name, and you know so

when we're communicating, we have to come across to him. He has to believe and know that we know what we're doing, that we have experts that are credible, that we have summarized and synthesized all of this stuff into a manageable form where adjuster can can digest all of this. What happened to this client, and they have to know that we if they don't, you know, give us a good settlement for a client. We're going to file a lawsuit and we're going to take it at trial. And if they don't believe that, we'll do that, then they're not going to give us maximum value. And they keep track of which law firms will file lawsuits, and they also keep track of which law which law firms that file lawsuits will actually go to trial. Lot of lawyers just file a lawsuit, but they won't take it to trial.

So, you know, they keep track of that they know, and that builds value for the client automatically, well and in terms of insurance defense lawyers, as I think, of our

catastrophic cases. It ends up being many, many times you know us and one of three or four other law firms in the state.

You know whether they're located in Charlotte or whether they're located at Raleigh or Greensboro or whatever, or Wilmington.

It ends up being one of those,

I don't know, 456, 10 firms, and every time it's the same lawyer for that firm. Is that your experience roughly, that is, I can think of

three catastrophic cases that we've dealt with in the last

two or three weeks that had the exact same attorney from Raleigh, and my experience is that those lawyers

are real pros.

They do what they say they're going to do. They do it when they say they're going to do it. They are credible, they are honest, and historically, in most instances, I would describe them as reasonable if we do the things that we need to do to build, develop a case and justify our demand. Is your experience similar? It is and the insurance companies are relying upon their defense counsel to let them know. Hey, you know? What do you know about these attorneys that are representing this injured person?

And if that experienced attorney, who was usually very good, says to them,

I don't really know this attorney, like I've I've never really seen them before, or I've heard their name, but I've never really seen anything like they're not in court. Very much kind of thing that's going to carry, like the adjuster, I know, having been an adjuster, when I hear that, I'm thinking, okay, my amount just dropped because I'm not concerned about this lawyer.

And so if the defense attorney says to me, Oh, I've had a bunch of cases with this, with this law firm, and these like, there are 345678,

lawyers in this law firm, and every one of them are really good, and they know what they're doing. And I've tried cases with them, and I've lost to them before,

or, you know, they drive a hard bargain, and they make a good case, they document their stuff, they know what they're doing.

This is not going to be an easy one. Then, as an adjuster, my value just went up, and not necessarily that I'm going to pay that much more. Maybe I do. But you.

Right. Adjusters set what we call reserves, which are money that the insurance company sets aside for a claim. And if you come with a credible personal injury attorney that the defense knows, and there is, you know, some healthy fear there, then that reserve is going to go higher. The risk for them goes up, and they have to set aside more money and and and be concerned. There are lots of firms out there, I think, that are probably qualified to do a rear end collision on Market Street or Independence Boulevard, where you have, you know, $2,500 in property damage. And you know

$10,000 you know, $10,000 in

medical treatment, maybe 5000 to the, er, 5000 to a chiropractor. There are lots of firms out there who are capable of handling that case. Is that fair? That is That is true. In fact, there are a lot of lawyers that don't do personal injury, but when a personal injury case comes in the door, they're like, Oh, I think I'll take that, you know, and that is a little scary. That's an easy place to get to mess up, I think. But, but, but the guys that do that, even the guys that might do a reasonable job on a on a small soft tissue, carp freer in collision somewhere,

because they have billboards, because they have TV commercials, because they advertise.

Does that mean that they're going to be capable and and qualified to do a what needs to be done in a catastrophic case? Not at all.

There are

a lot of good attorneys out there and a lot of attorneys that can handle a personal injury case, but to do it the right way in a catastrophic case, the you really have to have the experience doing it. You have to have done it multiple times, because there's so many nuances and so many twists and turns in a catastrophic case. You know, the case is headed this way, and then now some evidence is uncovered. Now it starts shifting this way, you know, back to the right and back to the left, back to the right and and you know, we're trying to guide that process and uncover that evidence and document these things. And if you're a lawyer and you don't have

an accident reconstructionist that you can use, you don't have an economist that you can use, you don't have a vocational rehabilitationist that you can use. You don't have a future medical analysis expert that you can use, and you don't even know who to call for these things. That's a problem, like the case is not going to get documented well, or you might not know that you even need to call those people. That is another point. And the other thing is, you have lawyers that you know. If they recognize they need to call somebody, they Google, okay, well, let you know local economists,

and they Google somebody, and they pull them up and call them and hire them. Well, who knows if that economist is good on the stand or not? If that economist knows what they're doing, if they can hold up under a deposition or a cross examination from one of these experienced defense attorneys like we've we've dealt with these people, we know that the experts that we have are good, and they're going to hold up, and they're going to document the case well. And if you're just Googling it and trying to find people potluck,

you know, that's not going to work out well. When you say evidence is uncovered. That made me think of a case that we worked on recently, where, as you know, and the way we've described it in the past, is

after your initial evidence is complete and the medical treatment is complete and we've prepared the demand that you described Cooper,

the investigation seems like it continues as we go through written discovery, as we go through depositions, particularly in catastrophic cases. And what ends up happening is it's almost like as we go we keep turning over stones, and we turned over stone, and then there's a fact, and we turn over another stone and there's a fact, and we turn over another stone and there's a fact, and turn over another stone and there's a fact. Meanwhile, these experienced lawyers that you referenced are also turning over stones, and sometimes those facts are good and sometimes those facts are bad, and and so what my observation is, is that,

is that, if you have that experience, and if you have those relationships that you described Jeff, that even if you turn over a stone that has a bad fact, you know how to respond to that, you have the relationships, the knowledge, the experience, and also, equally important the team to be able to address that and respond to that, and move around, move on and turn over other stones that might be beneficial to your case and help tell your client's story, and help really maximize the value in that clay. Is that consistent with your observation? It is, and this is something.

Doing from beginning to end, like when we write the demand letter, when Cooper writes the man letter, he's not pulling out the bad facts. They're in there. The adjuster is going to find them. There's no way to hide those things. He's trying to pull out the good facts. He's trying to highlight, you know, our case and what's strong about our case. And as the case goes on, we're continuing to do that. And yes, bad facts come up. You know, we discussed a case this week where as the case, you know, we thought the case was really strong. A bunch of facts came out, and it looked like the case wasn't now very strong. So what do you do? Do you fold up your tent and go home and take whatever they're offering? Or do you fight for the client and figure out a way? And so, you know, what we did was we, you know, we collaborated. We all of our experienced attorneys got together, we put our heads together, and it's something that no one attorney could have done, and we put our heads together with a lot of experienced attorneys, and we came up with some creative ideas that actually might turn this case back to the positive, where we can get an expert and document some things, where we can get a videographer to come in and create a video that a jury could see, like a 3d animation kind of thing,

where we can pull out certain facts and and evidence that might turn this case back in our favor. And so we're that's what we're trying to do is, you know, we're continuing to fight for the client, and if we can do that in this case, then this case swings back in our favor, and now the defense is on on their heels, and we're in the you know, and our client is now advantaged. And so now the case value goes back up again. So I know the case you're talking about, and I can't I'm very excited to see the animation that comes from that, especially as relates to line of sight. Line of Sight is sometimes important. It's important in in that case, and you're right, that collaboration was critical. Phyllis, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you being here and sharing this information with us, and I think it'll, it'll be helpful to a lot of people. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Appreciate you having me. Thank you for joining us, and we'll see you next time you.

Clarke, welcome to the catastrophic comeback podcast with American injury lawyer. Clark speaks helping you find hope, purpose and joy after a catastrophic injury.

So if there are adjusters that focus more on catastrophic cases, then in our catastrophic cases, and the catastrophic cases that we work on, and we build,

my experience is we see the same adjusters and the same lawyers in these kinds of catastrophic cases, over and over and over again, and then the relationships and the credibility and the manner in which you justify your demands becomes very important.

Yeah, absolutely. I can tell you the name, I'm not going to mention here, but I can tell you the name of the catastrophic adjuster for Farm Bureau who's, you know, in the who handles the state of North Carolina in this region, because I talk to them all the time when we're doing these catastrophic cases,

and they all go to this one guy who's got a lot of experience, he's been doing this a long time. And we know each other. You know my first name, and you know so

when we're communicating, we have to come across to him. He has to believe and know that we know what we're doing, that we have experts that are credible, that we have summarized and synthesized all of this stuff into a manageable form where adjuster can can digest all of this. What happened to this client, and they have to know that we if they don't, you know, give us a good settlement for a client. We're going to file a lawsuit and we're going to take it at trial. And if they don't believe that, we'll do that, then they're not going to give us maximum value. And they keep track of which law firms will file lawsuits, and they also keep track of which law which law firms that file lawsuits will actually go to trial. Lot of lawyers just file a lawsuit, but they won't take it to trial.

So, you know, they keep track of that they know, and that builds value for the client automatically, well and in terms of insurance defense lawyers, as I think, of our

catastrophic cases. It ends up being many, many times you know us and one of three or four other law firms in the state.

You know whether they're located in Charlotte or whether they're located at Raleigh or Greensboro or whatever, or Wilmington.

It ends up being one of those,

I don't know, 456, 10 firms, and every time it's the same lawyer for that firm. Is that your experience roughly, that is, I can think of

three catastrophic cases that we've dealt with in the last

two or three weeks that had the exact same attorney from Raleigh, and my experience is that those lawyers

are real pros.

They do what they say they're going to do. They do it when they say they're going to do it. They are credible, they are honest, and historically, in most instances, I would describe them as reasonable if we do the things that we need to do to build, develop a case and justify our demand. Is your experience similar? It is and the insurance companies are relying upon their defense counsel to let them know. Hey, you know? What do you know about these attorneys that are representing this injured person?

And if that experienced attorney, who was usually very good, says to them,

I don't really know this attorney, like I've I've never really seen them before, or I've heard their name, but I've never really seen anything like they're not in court. Very much kind of thing that's going to carry, like the adjuster, I know, having been an adjuster, when I hear that, I'm thinking, okay, my amount just dropped because I'm not concerned about this lawyer.

And so if the defense attorney says to me, Oh, I've had a bunch of cases with this, with this law firm, and these like, there are 345678,

lawyers in this law firm, and every one of them are really good, and they know what they're doing. And I've tried cases with them, and I've lost to them before,

or, you know, they drive a hard bargain, and they make a good case, they document their stuff, they know what they're doing.

This is not going to be an easy one. Then, as an adjuster, my value just went up, and not necessarily that I'm going to pay that much more. Maybe I do. But you.

Right. Adjusters set what we call reserves, which are money that the insurance company sets aside for a claim. And if you come with a credible personal injury attorney that the defense knows, and there is, you know, some healthy fear there, then that reserve is going to go higher. The risk for them goes up, and they have to set aside more money and and and be concerned. There are lots of firms out there, I think, that are probably qualified to do a rear end collision on Market Street or Independence Boulevard, where you have, you know, $2,500 in property damage. And you know

$10,000 you know, $10,000 in

medical treatment, maybe 5000 to the, er, 5000 to a chiropractor. There are lots of firms out there who are capable of handling that case. Is that fair? That is That is true. In fact, there are a lot of lawyers that don't do personal injury, but when a personal injury case comes in the door, they're like, Oh, I think I'll take that, you know, and that is a little scary. That's an easy place to get to mess up, I think. But, but, but the guys that do that, even the guys that might do a reasonable job on a on a small soft tissue, carp freer in collision somewhere,

because they have billboards, because they have TV commercials, because they advertise.

Does that mean that they're going to be capable and and qualified to do a what needs to be done in a catastrophic case? Not at all.

There are

a lot of good attorneys out there and a lot of attorneys that can handle a personal injury case, but to do it the right way in a catastrophic case, the you really have to have the experience doing it. You have to have done it multiple times, because there's so many nuances and so many twists and turns in a catastrophic case. You know, the case is headed this way, and then now some evidence is uncovered. Now it starts shifting this way, you know, back to the right and back to the left, back to the right and and you know, we're trying to guide that process and uncover that evidence and document these things. And if you're a lawyer and you don't have

an accident reconstructionist that you can use, you don't have an economist that you can use, you don't have a vocational rehabilitationist that you can use. You don't have a future medical analysis expert that you can use, and you don't even know who to call for these things. That's a problem, like the case is not going to get documented well, or you might not know that you even need to call those people. That is another point. And the other thing is, you have lawyers that you know. If they recognize they need to call somebody, they Google, okay, well, let you know local economists,

and they Google somebody, and they pull them up and call them and hire them. Well, who knows if that economist is good on the stand or not? If that economist knows what they're doing, if they can hold up under a deposition or a cross examination from one of these experienced defense attorneys like we've we've dealt with these people, we know that the experts that we have are good, and they're going to hold up, and they're going to document the case well. And if you're just Googling it and trying to find people potluck,

you know, that's not going to work out well. When you say evidence is uncovered. That made me think of a case that we worked on recently, where, as you know, and the way we've described it in the past, is

after your initial evidence is complete and the medical treatment is complete and we've prepared the demand that you described Cooper,

the investigation seems like it continues as we go through written discovery, as we go through depositions, particularly in catastrophic cases. And what ends up happening is it's almost like as we go we keep turning over stones, and we turned over stone, and then there's a fact, and we turn over another stone and there's a fact, and we turn over another stone and there's a fact, and turn over another stone and there's a fact. Meanwhile, these experienced lawyers that you referenced are also turning over stones, and sometimes those facts are good and sometimes those facts are bad, and and so what my observation is, is that,

is that, if you have that experience, and if you have those relationships that you described Jeff, that even if you turn over a stone that has a bad fact, you know how to respond to that, you have the relationships, the knowledge, the experience, and also, equally important the team to be able to address that and respond to that, and move around, move on and turn over other stones that might be beneficial to your case and help tell your client's story, and help really maximize the value in that clay. Is that consistent with your observation? It is, and this is something.

Doing from beginning to end, like when we write the demand letter, when Cooper writes the man letter, he's not pulling out the bad facts. They're in there. The adjuster is going to find them. There's no way to hide those things. He's trying to pull out the good facts. He's trying to highlight, you know, our case and what's strong about our case. And as the case goes on, we're continuing to do that. And yes, bad facts come up. You know, we discussed a case this week where as the case, you know, we thought the case was really strong. A bunch of facts came out, and it looked like the case wasn't now very strong. So what do you do? Do you fold up your tent and go home and take whatever they're offering? Or do you fight for the client and figure out a way? And so, you know, what we did was we, you know, we collaborated. We all of our experienced attorneys got together, we put our heads together, and it's something that no one attorney could have done, and we put our heads together with a lot of experienced attorneys, and we came up with some creative ideas that actually might turn this case back to the positive, where we can get an expert and document some things, where we can get a videographer to come in and create a video that a jury could see, like a 3d animation kind of thing,

where we can pull out certain facts and and evidence that might turn this case back in our favor. And so we're that's what we're trying to do is, you know, we're continuing to fight for the client, and if we can do that in this case, then this case swings back in our favor, and now the defense is on on their heels, and we're in the you know, and our client is now advantaged. And so now the case value goes back up again. So I know the case you're talking about, and I can't I'm very excited to see the animation that comes from that, especially as relates to line of sight. Line of Sight is sometimes important. It's important in in that case, and you're right, that collaboration was critical. Phyllis, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you being here and sharing this information with us, and I think it'll, it'll be helpful to a lot of people. Thank you for being here. Thank you. Appreciate you having me. Thank you for joining us, and we'll see you next time you.