Oh, I get along with him well, but he can’t handle it when somebody fights back. Can’t figure out the other defense counsel on that one. He’s in bed with Tom some kind of way.
Oh, Perry had another one he wanted set and said it was so important (raw sewage). After Judge told him that he'd set it, but it probably wouldn't get reached, he asked that it be moved to #1 on the docket. I volunteered to give up #2, so he was boxed in and had to agree. I should get the jury list when it comes out this time since I'm on that other case too, but send it to me as soon as you get it. I'll start passing it around to some of the people that help us out.
Are self insureds ever not stingy with their settlement offers? If they low ball the pre suit offer then they have a good chance of now paying a defense attorney and a settlement/judgment pretty close to what the presuit offer was.
Sitting in a depo right now. My client has just taken 3 minutes to remember which languages he speaks. This is gonna take a while. edit: He just said that his Marital status is "great." Now I just need him to be asked what his sex is and for him to respond "yes please"
We won't do a full lockdown again because too many morons will revolt, but yeah, we are rapidly approaching a full damn reset on this covid shit and it's infuriating
I have a trial going out in Cullman on Monday. They had "Rock the South," a pop-country music festival with a turnout of 50k, last weekend and a Trump rally this Saturday night. I'd rather be in Kabul.
My shit ass town already switched back to jury selection at the courthouses. They haven’t been doing shit to ask about vaccines or feeling sick, being in contact, taking temps, enforcing masks, etc. They just informed 100 potential jurors that someone tested positive and to please quarantine.
I just signed up two MVA clients that found us from ....wait for it....a DUI google ad. Their case had no drunk driving involved. One of them did say they couldn't read or write. That may have played a role.
I can see it now. Mid trial of a lengthy week long trial. Suddenly 6 of your jurors pop positive with symptoms. Oopsie poopsie, let’s start it again.
Man, you're everywhere. Choctaw scares me to death. I've never seen a place revel in its own corruptness so much.
I would love to hear these stories. Mine wasn't nearly that bad but the partner was just a piece of shit and didn't speak to me for 2 weeks. He previously was in the office maybe 1-2 days a week (this was pre-COVID) and then those two weeks he was in the office every day and would look at me and not say a word to me. Mind you, I had worked for a year for him making $30k and at the end of the year I had suggested I needed to be moved up to the average pay rate and he said they couldn't afford it (they absolutely could, he just didn't want to pay it), so I said thanks, but this is my two weeks notice. No words to me after that and on my last day I'm waiting in line at a lunch place with a co-worker and my soon-to-be ex-boss gets in line behind us by like 2 people. Still not a word or anything. Moved on and it's been 6.5 yrs and I still think he can get fucked.
When I put in my two week notice at my last job, my boss stopped talking to me, started talking shit about me to defense attorneys, told me to leave after one week of my two weeks period, refused to pay me for the 2nd week, and then also refused to pay me about $30k that he had promised to pay me into a retirement account. Then he threatened to sue me for "tortious interference" when ONE client tracked me down after I left and begged me to handle their case.
OC was a newbie and instead of taking advantage of my client, wrapped up in 30 min and then said we need to talk settlement.
My old boss was a complete ass and notorious for it. He stopped caring about his practice by the time I came along. By the time I left he was probably 70 years old. He had a 200k line of credit and kept it pretty maxed out. Often he couldn't make payroll and he just wouldn't pay the associates. He decided to do a ton of pet projects like helping a local Indian tribe get certification and benefits. But he wasn't making any money and was running the firm into the ground. He would give med mal death cases or complicated bad faith insurance claims to 1st year associates as lead counsel with basically no oversight. I worked there for like 3.5 years. His health got really bad near the end and his management got even worse. He was a huge dick to me all the time. He'd try to pit staff against each other or associates against each other. Played mind games and was mentally abusive to staff and lawyers. He had surveillance cameras in my air vent in my office and other ones. I didn't find out until it got really hot and I called an AC guy who said yah no AC is blowing because there's a damn camera in your vent. Also raccoons would get in our attic and wild cats would be under the office and the office would get terribly infested by fleas. He'd refuse to get real help and just want to use store products until I raised hell enough. I left on no notice and brought as many clients with me as possible. I knew it would be a blood bath. He's had scorched earth battles with many lawyers that have left his firm over the years. He sent a notice of lien on every case outlining the history of me at the firm, the circumstances of me leaving, and alleging that I would intentionally refuse to bill my time properly on plaintiff files (he wanted to get away from a quantum meruit division of fees), left on one hour notice, etc. That was on every file. Every lawyer I dealt with on those files knew he was an ass and didn't think twice about it. Shortly after I left he had the last hold out lawyer at his firm send me an email saying they would sue my "baby lawyer ass." I sued him first in a dec action. He had too many enemies and fights going on and too poor health to put much into our litigation. I never even had to have a hearing on the case. Shortly after I left I had to go to his office to get a bunch of client files. He sat me down in the conference room with a ton of members of his staff and tried to intimidate me. I walked out. I got the client files. Probably did about $350,000 in fees on those files over the next few years. That's with splitting the fees with him. So it was probably like $700k in fees maybe more. Eventually we mediated with him and agreed to a 50/50 fee split. Everything has worked out well in the long term. A year or two after I left he talked a bunch of shit to a guy that was banging a girl he was also banging, she was probably gold digging. He got beat up. He was like 70 years old. The other guy was probably in his 30s or 40s. Shortly thereafter he was walking around at his house and just fell out. Had bleeding in his brain. Passed away a few days later. There were multiple lawsuits against him at the time of his death. One was a civil rights claim by his old secretary. He told her , in the presence of others, that she was terrible at her job but had great tits and a nice ass, so he kept her around. He was also going through a terrible divorce with his wife of like 30 years and the mother of 4 of his children at the time of his death. He had like 9 kids overall by tons of different women. Like I said, the last 10 years of his life , he just burned everything to the ground.
Goodness gracious. That is awful. Basically my exact opposite experience. My senior/managing partner, works long hours, generates a ton on revenue, and made me an equal partner (along with the other lawyer in our office) within 5 years. I couldn't have asked for better.
He's an incredible guy. I had no intention of working here or anywhere near here, but the opportunity fell into my lap. He's made a ton of money to the point that he doesn't need to practice law anymore, but he does it because he enjoys it. He wanted me to stick around, and I definitely did.
And since the venue is dangerous, the ones you don't get, you're usually getting phone calls all the time to help the Defense. It's a good/solid book of business.
There are tradeoffs, no doubt. My kids have to drive a little ways to go to a decent school. But I each lunch with them during the summer. Don't have vacation days or set hours--extremely flexible. Almost never go into the office on the weekends.
How daunted should I be about pursuing a med mal claim against the VA under the FTCA? If this were a straight up med mal against a local hospital and doctor it would otherwise be a pretty decent payday.
We've done several of them . I wrapped one up recently pre suit. When the liability is clear, they like to resolve them up pre suit. What else do you want to know.
I’ve only ever been tangentially involved in FTCA claims so I probably have lots of questions. However, preliminarily is there a notice requirement before initiating presuit?
oh yah, def have to submit notice of claim form. I'll send you a PM with my email . Email me and I'll send you what you need.
Petty beef, but I find it annoying that insurance companies first move is to always file a MFET to respond to the complaint. It takes literally 5 minutes and zero research to respond. In the 5 minutes you spent pulling up the MFET template, you could have pulled up the MTD template you are inevitably filing.
Like in house lawyers or their outside counsel? Often times on the defense side I did MFET because I would get the file late and didn't have what I needed to know which affirmative defenses to file.