had a woman pass out temporarily during a depo in our office yesterday. EMT had to come. She was fine. Pretty wild scene to come to after taking a deuce
A girl in my law school class (whose younger sister was in your class) fainted in the gallery during jury selection in a med-mal case while she was a summer clerk. The defendant doctor hopped over the rail and revived her in the presence of the entire venire. Needless to say, it resulted in a mistrial.
I just took the driver's depo and he said the rear lift guard has an alarm that is supposed to beep until the guard is down. The alarm was not working so he couldn't tell if the guard was up or down. Also the rear camera was not working so it was difficult for him to know whether the guard was up or down. He testified that he notified the company for weeks prior to the incident that these issues were present. The big issue with the case is damages. She has some moderate findings showing up on cervical MRI. But the property damage doesn't look all that bad and the adjuster just doesn't buy that my lady was hurt because some power lines hit her car. I'm still kind of unclear on whether the traffic light hit her car or not. It did knock off her side mirrors and leave some long black marks on the side of her truck. My client said she swerved off the road to try and avoid it and everything in the back seat of her truck ended up on the floor in the front seat. Conservative jurisdiction as well.
Those are great facts. Always better to pin the negligence on the corp versus the driver just being a dufus. Make sure you have all the maintenance records etc then take a corp rep and slam him. How old is the truck? Was it just the lines that hit the car or the pole too? Was it energized when it fell on her? Assuming the medical is worked up correctly, that case is worth a few 100k. That's based on a decent Texas venue. Not sure where you are.
I’m not sure if I’ve discussed this case before or not, if so ignore it. My last corporate rep depo was my favorite. This company is as hired to do inspections/preservation services on a home in foreclosure. Unbeknownst to them, the house they are looking for burned down several years ago. They mistakenly identify my client’s home as the house they are looking for. The other key is that they don’t order preservation services for an occupied home. I could prove via their own documents that at time they ordered people to change locks on my client’s house that they: (a) had reports that they had the wrong house; and (b) that they knew the house was occupied. Yet they ordered the preservation services anyway. I’m questioning corporate rep over these documents and he ultimately says, I can’t explain why that happened. They never should have been ordered. Their counsel is still denying liability.
Hurt herself having to climb in through window of home (elderly widowed AA), so that gets me to mental anguish, with an expert ready to testify to such, and then we’ll pop with punitives. All this taking place in arguably the most liberal venue in the state. I’ve got multiple defendants due to subcontractors. I’ve settled with one. Spoke with the defense lawyer, she says jury is going to give me any number I ask for. I concur.
We just dropped Westlaw and switched to Lexis. Fuck me. I know lexis is cheaper, but guys that run your own shop -- how drastic is the price change?
So, what would y’all do in this situation mediated a case with two clients. We settled both and they signed the agreement at the mediators office. now the husband is saying he doesn’t want to take the offer and wants like $200k in his pocket. We settled at mediation for like $25k total. he says he wants us to go to trial and I’ve told him 5x man you released your claim at mediation and I told you that and the mediator told you that. I called his now ex wife who was there too and she was like yes you told him that and told him what he would get so I don’t know what he’s talking about do we file a motion to withdraw with the court? Like I don’t know the procedure when a client settles the case, signs an agreement at the mediators office which is effectively a release, and now doesn’t want to go through with it
Has the mediator sent a report to the judge? If not, I'd ask that he did and then file a motion to withdraw. The defense counsel can then file a motion to enforce the settlement.
Right I’ve told him this 5x at least and so has my staff he’s trying to be like well y’all didn’t tell me xyz glad his ex wife was there to verify that we did
You could probably file an attorney's lien on the recovery and still get your fee. It's probably not worth it for a guy who like that, though.
I am confident we did everything perfectly on this one and have documented everything perfectly as well. Ill think about that. Likely not worth the hassle though
Then do it. The defense lawyer will cut you a check for the amount of the lien and then send the rest to the plaintiff. You'll almost certainly end up with a bar complaint, but that's probably going to happen anyway with this nut. Might as well get paid for responding to it.
I think it’s heading that direction too. But I have to think it will get dismissed pretty quickly. The mediator we used has mediated like 10,000 cases.
lexis is so fucking awful i went from westlawnext to lexis and it makes me want to go back into retirement
Anybody have a WSJ subscription and want to copy/pasta for me? Expert just referenced this article that was posted today, we have a doctor doing the exact same thing: https://www.wsj.com/articles/who-wins-in-a-personal-injury-lawsuit-it-can-be-the-doctor-11578479400 Basically, a neurosurgeon doesn't accept insurance, only takes PI referrals, and before cutting on a Plaintiff calls and talks to the Pltf's Firm about the case/chances of recovery/dollar amounts, etc., then enters into an agreement whereby he gets paid off the top of any settlement.
I did the same thing when my old firm switched from westlaw to lexis. Lexis lasted about two weeks. now I’m stuck with lexis and it’s miserable.
But to answer the original question.....West Law is expensive AF. And they seeminly don't give a fuck about losing folks because we told them were going to change if they don't revisit their pricing, and they never even attempted to keep our business or follow up to get us back lol
I've always wondered just how expensive it is. Clearly they have different pricing models, time spent/per search/etc. Buy I have used westlaw with reckless abandon over the years and no one has ever said a thing to me about it.
My new firm is transactional only and refuses to hire litigators. It's a blessing being away from you shitheads.
I still don’t entirely understand the billing model for transactional work. How long can it possibly take to draft a contract?
just got this email from the guy who signed the mediated settlement agreement: Are we going to court Get Outlook for Android
maybe he meant to put it on the record? Which would be rare but I guess sometimes necessary if you are really close to trial or some shit.