How to Choose an Attorney After a Terrible Tragedy

How do you help your friends and loved ones get to a reputable law firm?

I Guess I Can Dream.

With over 30 years of handling catastrophic injury cases I am often contacted by friends and family of someone who just had a horrible injury or even death in the family.

I am always at a loss of how I can respond to their concerns about the spouse or the children of the victim.

I as an attorney and they as a family member do not want to intrude on the grief or the hectic situation that often turns the family upside down.

But sadly I often see 3 situations

1. The defendant (frequently an insurance company or trucking company or other corporation) are busy gathering or hiding or destroying evidence.

This includes things like locating and interviewing witnesses, taping over or losing videos and disposing of property damage.

It is very frustrating because I know our investigator and attorneys could be protecting their rights, while they are attending to their loved ones medical situations, children, loss of income in the household, a destroyed car or worse funeral arrangements.

Why are people made to feel sleazy if they have a lawyer working for them immediately after a tragedy?

Meanwhile insurance companies and businesses are expected to have a team of lawyers and experts, 24/7 and often at the scene before first-responders.

Recently we had a catastrophically injured client crushed by a fallen object. The defendants removed the object before the ambulance picked up our client!

2. Unethical attorneys and hired runners are contacting and soliciting people who they don’t know often at the hospitals in the ER or places that they aren’t thinking straight.

The scariest part is the lawyers who engage in this kind of conduct are usually the least experienced or most ill equipped to handle such a serious case.

We saw a badly injured wife this week who’s husband was killed in the same wreck, just settle her case for only $1M (thinking she was set for life). The tractor trailer driver who killed him worked for a company who has tens of millions in insurance. Sadly she hired the wrong attorney.

3. Many people make the decision of hiring a lawyer based on a TV or other marketing strategy.

All I will say is that after 30+ years of litigating serious cases, I have never seen a lawyer who does heavy TV marketing in the court house.

Trust me adjusters don’t pay top dollars to non-trial attorneys.

Have you ever seen a TV lawyer talking about a record jury verdict? Nope they brag on $100K settlements (in the type of wrecks that we collect millions).

Many times we have been hired after the client fires such low skilled lawyers and we find additional insurance coverage missed by the first lawyer.

I wish I could accomplish 2 things:

1. Find an acceptable way for people to communicate with their family and loved ones about getting an experienced lawyer immediately after a tragedy.

or better yet

2. Convince people to do research and their due diligence and make a lawyer selection in advance “just in case of tragedy”; like they do for estate planning and other important decisions.

I guess I can dream.

We have a best selling book on Amazon, we offer it for free to friends and clients. Just call 912-920-2000 WINNING YOUR CASE: 21 Questions You MUST ASK Before Hiring a Lawyer.

Never settle for less!

Please show your friend or loved one this 2 1/2 minute video

Please watch this 2 minute video

Howard Spiva:

I’ve learned that preventable, Needless harms and losses and wrongful deaths there needs to be justice for them and I saw that as a child.

Having my father murdered when I was six years old that’s had a big impact on my life and why I chose to go into the personal injury law and why I like to help people.

They’re injured, they have medical bills they can’t pay, they can’t work and they have lost income, they don’t know if they’re going to lose their home. We take that off of them.

We’ll take care of the bill collectors. We’ll take care getting your medical bills paid.

It’s hard for an individual to go up against big corporations, trucking companies, insurance companies, a city, a county, a municipality. A lawsuit is like a war and if you’re going to war you better make darn sure that you have the right team on your side.

If you don’t have a team on your side that has the finances and the resources and the experience to stand up and ask for what sometimes is millions of dollars, you’re not gonna get full justice.

In order to go before twelve strangers and go before a judge and tell someone’s story, if you’re not passionate and your heart’s not in it you can’t fool twelve people.

You’ve got to have the tenacity, you’ve got to have the passion, you’ve got to be able to zealously represent your client and stand up against the Goliaths of the world.

Make It A Great Day!!

Howard Spiva

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The State of Georgia is divided into 159 counties, more than any other state except Texas.

The Spiva Law Group is located in Savannah, Chatham County, Georgia.

Our attorneys are licensed to practice law in Federal (Southern District), State and Superior courts in all 159 counties of Georgia.

Georgia counties include: Appling, Atkinson, Bacon, Baker, Baldwin, Banks, Barrow, Bartow, Ben Hill, Berrien, Bibb, Bleckley, Brantley, Brooks, Bryan, Bulloch, Burke, Butts, Calhoun, Camden, Candler, Carroll, Catoosa, Charlton, Chatham, Chattahoochee, Chattooga, Cherokee, Clarke, Clay, Clayton, Clinch, Cobb, Coffee, Colquitt, Columbia, Cook, Coweta, Crawford, Crisp, Dade, Dawson, De Kalb, Decatur, Dodge, Dooly, Dougherty, Douglas, Early, Echols, Effingham, Elbert, Emanuel, Evans, Fannin, Fayette, Floyd, Forsyth, Franklin, Fulton, Gilmer, Glascock, Glynn, Gordon, Grady, Greene, Gwinnett, Habersham, Hall, Hancock, Haralson, Harris, Hart, Heard, Henry, Houston, Irwin, Jackson, Jasper, Jeff Davis, Jefferson, Jenkins, Johnson, Jones, Lamar, Lanier, Laurens, Lee, Liberty, Lincoln, Long, Lowndes, Lumpkin, Macon, Madison, Marion, McDuffie, McIntosh, Meriwether, Miller, Mitchell, Monroe, Montgomery, Morgan, Murray, Muscogee, Newton, Oconee, Oglethorpe, Paulding, Peach, Pickens, Pierce, Pike, Polk, Pulaski, Putnam, Quitman, Rabun, Randolph, Richmond, Rockdale, Schley, Screven, Seminole, Spalding, Stephens, Stewart, Sumter, Talbot, Taliaferro, Tattnall, Taylor, Telfair, Terrell, Thomas, Tift, Toombs, Towns, Treutlen, Troup, Turner, Twiggs, Union, Upson, Walker, Walton, Ware, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Webster, Wheeler, White, Whitfield, Wilcox, Wilkes, Wilkinson, Worth.

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