Proskauer can suck a fat one!!

PI law to TTTorTTT Reform!

This is exactly the sort of thread that would fit right in on Above the Law Junior.

It's hard to believe epic douche bags like 4 even exist.

Please do a thread on rapper representation & defense. There can't be a better way for a solo lawyer to chase tail and drive fast cars.

The simple truth is that most of ATL's audience is very afraid of public speaking, which is an integral part of trial practice.

5 - really? You must be new to the internet.

I'm a top 10% 3L at NYLS and have an interesting situation I'm hoping I could get some advice from the ATL crowd on. I've decided that I'm willing to do personal injury work, but the fact is that I'm in the top 10% of my class, did well in moot court, have mock trial experience, interned for a non-profit last summer, have a relevant degree from a prestigious undergrad university, etc.. How do I go about negotiating my salary upwards from the usual P.I. rates? Do I bring it up at the initial interview or wait until I'm offered the job? Once I get multiple offers, should I let them know I'm negotiating with multiple places, or is that frowned upon? I am willing to be flexible but won't be cheated. Please advise. Thanks in advance.

4

I think this thread would be more appropriate for Below Above the Law.

Although working in personal injury would allow an aspiring lawyer to accrue mass wealth (unlikely, considering that they are in personal injury as a result of working insufficiently hard earlier in life), it is not worth the metamorphosis into a parasite that would result from said work.

Incidentally, I do covetable legal work at my father's preeminent peer law firm.

9, practice crying on demand and threaten suicide

Recent grad here. I've been mailing out to several small law firms specializing in PI, but I've yet to nail an interview. I'm wondering, has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?

i'm afraid 11 is on point.

9 -

If you are not a flame, consider this. You are a partner at the firm and you interview...you. All the credentials are great, but PI law is unlike any other area of law. You must get results. It is result oriented. As such, you are not any more qualified than any other graduate. You have yet to prove yourself.

I do not say this to discourage you or talk down to you. Get in the door, crush it, and do something that 99% of the tools who frequent this site cannot do. Point to numbers and say, "this is because of me. I brought in this money." Once you prove your merit via real dollars, you can a). get better PI cases and b.) negotiate a better cut of the pie.

Good luck...

9, Grades and class rank don't mean much in PI. Winning cases and making money does. Moot court is a good thing to have, but it is not that similar to a jury trial. Try to go to a firm that lets you take depositions and try cases right away. My 2 cents.

Lat --

Since you keep quoting the comments from these threads, please know that I'm still waiting for a good thread on federal government work.

Specifically, DOJ/FDO, which aren't exactly identical in terms of prestige but are supposed to be on equal footing (I think) with salary and benefits. I want advice on how to enter--and later leave--federal government work.

13, sorry, can't say I've ever "really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like."

how 'bout a poo poo platter of some of that obamacare?

Lat,

This thread is going to be a disaster given the topic, but please don't lose faith on the idea of these practice-specific threads altogether.

Aside from PI, they're probably not a bad idea.

(Also, 17's suggestion re: federal work is probably a bad idea given the wide diversity of practices covered by gov't attys. Stick with the practice-specific threads, and the fed attys - like myself - will chime in where appropriate).

13 - Crash your car into their building. Pretty sure they'll talk to you then.

Mailing your unsolicited resume is about as useful as farting when you're alone - only you appreciate the effort.

PI is for the non-risk-averse lawyer.

When you get your hands on a great case, it's time to hang a shingle. Dump tens of thousands of dollars of your own money trying to outlast the defense firm and get to trial (or at least legitimately frighten them into trial). The payout can be substantial. Many (but by no means most) plaintiffs' lawyers can make far more money than any of you V10 d-bags can ever dream of in Biglaw.

Kash- I just puked in the garbage can in my office. Since you have the swine flu, can you tell me whether puking in garbage cans while thinking about banging your secretary in the crapper is a symptom? Thanks.

13 = LLM

Something to keep in mind if you're thinking of transitioning from biglaw to small law from someone who's done it... although small law is a lot less demanding (I rarely get more than a couple emails over the weekend), it's also hella boring and things like personal time are often much more "by the book" (for instance, "hard" vacation time -- meaning time you are not in the office during office hours -- versus the "soft" vacation policies at most biglaw firms. That day you worked from home for a few hours and then spent some time with your visiting in-laws will count as a "vacation day" depending on how draconian your HR department is, in spite of the fact that you had made up for it by working late two days that week).

I would definitely take other posters' advice to find a place that actually lets you do things like take depos, etc. I frankly got much more and much better experience at biglaw and find myself more often than not missing both the salary AND the work. While I'm less stressed out at my current job and have a lot more free time, I'd say I probably hate my job just as much, but for different reasons. A big one is that the current job doesn't do a damn thing for my career. I feel like I'm just doing work to pull in a paycheck, whereas at biglaw I was actually building skills and learning areas of the law that would help my career to grow.

It's tough to complain, as biglaw laid me off and I took the first offer I got so as to make rent payments. I certainly wouldn't blame anyone who followed in my footsteps. But to the extent you have any choice in the matter, these are some things to think about. Small law isn't all what it's cracked up to be.

22 and 25 - Good comments. Thanks.

Serious threads should be posted on the weekends, less trolls around.

Your next small firm topic should be on family law. We have the best stories. No need for reality TV. The real housewives of (fill in your county or city here) come to your office every single day. It's usually pretty funny until the kids get all jacked up but then its like the TV show: Toddlers & Tiaras.

I like Magnum PI

I went to a top 10 law school. Why on earth would I want to use my expensive law degree to do something that anyone can do?

21 - Mailing my unsolicited resume landed me an offer at one of the most profitable firms in the country. Don't spew bad advice in a bad economy.

John Edwards gives personal injury lawyers a bad name.

31 - Most unsolicited resumes go in the trash. Blind resumes mean crap - especially in a bad economy.

Based on one of ATL's other threads today, my guess is you are a minority lesbian. The proverbial tri-fecta for firms pretending to give a shit about diveristy.

9 - I concur heartily with 15 & 16. Those with good law school credentials over-rate their value once the foot's in the door (except for S. Ct. clerkship and a few other truly attention-getting achievements that obviously are treasured) and, at smaller firms or PI firms, they might even be a slight liability (due to reverse snobbism aka envy).

Out in the marketplace, it's "show me the money."

21 - Props on the fart comment.

33 - White straight male. What matters in a bad economy is trying as many avenues as possible. It is not that difficult to make a resume, visit a firm's site, and write a cover letter -- took me about 3 minutes per firm. After striking out at OCI, my mail campaign ended up bailing me out and landing me a great job.

31 - Name the firm or crawl back to your cubicle you doc reviewin' beyatch.

PE just filed for bankruptcy. Discover Card is one of his biggest creditors. But I wonder if the Rick's Cabaret expenses are nondischargeable as luxury items.

I briefly (about 4-5 months) practiced small law when I started my career. On the plus side, it wasn't stressful, the hours were reasonable, and I occasionally felt like I was helping a worthy client avoid an unjust outcome.

However, after about 2-3 months it started to get boring. I wasn't really litigating. I rarely saw complex or interesting legal problems. It seemed like I was doing the same thing over and over again.

I switched to criminal defense and later prosecution and found both to be far more interesting. However, to be sure, they both required a much more significant time commitment.

These days I work in a GC office and while my work is diverse and interesting, there are definitely days when I miss arguing in front of a jury or a panel of appellate judges. The nerdy adrenaline rush you get in the courtroom beats pretty much everything else I've done as an attorney.

Here's what I saw working at a decent PI firm as a clerk. PI may not be the best way to get tons of trial experience. That's because good PI lawyers know how to pick cases and then settle them out either before filing suit or through discovery prior to trial. So you'll learn a lot about discovery and motion practice, but trials aren't as common as one thinks.

Also, it appeared that income is all over the charts from year to year. More so for the partners, but also for the associates. As an associate, you really are basically an income partner. If you don't pull your weight, you'll be compensated accordingly. Again, these are just my observations as a clerk.

36 - 3 minutes per firm? way to put some thought into it. A great job? Really? You still practiving law?

Let's be honest; if the entire country was like California (meaning you don't have to go to an accredited law school to take and/or pass the bar), the best PI lawyers wouldn't even law school graduates. Those guys (and girls) don't practice law; they work hard at digging up prejudicial facts (whether relevant or irrelevant) and make a living playing off of sympathies and corporate greed and hate.

All aspiring PI lawyers, here is what you need to know: duty, breach, causation, harm. No go find the biggest and baddest corporations to sue and be sure to thank me when you start rolling in the hundreds of thousands of dollars that companies are willing to pay to settle rather than face a sympathetic jury.

37: The law offices of Ima Liar.

Is the rumor about Boston chicks sharting true?

Concerned in Boston

32 beat me to it - you're really gonna list John Edwards as a "good example" of anything only hours after Elie bashes an actual saint (and sneakily edited it out)? If I wanted this kind of bias, I'd have picked up today's New York Times.

42 - Amen. Great comment. This is why we need tort reform.

What I don't get is this: everyone trumpets tort reform because of "sympathetic juries," but why don't these companied hire the best trial lawyers to fight back against this or not harm a plaintiff in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, tort reform is an attempt to change the rules because one side doesn't like losing. Buck up, stop making mistakes or at least hire a damn good trial lawyer to expose the money grubbing plaintiffs if they are not really hurt. That would cost a lot less than hiring PR people and lobbyists to pass tort reform.

9 - I'm going to pretend you're a real person and not another ATL bullshit artist.

Others have made this point, but maybe not as explicitly:

You are offering absolutely nothing to justify a higher start salary.

Nothing.

Outside of Biglaw (and wannabe Biglaw), all of your qualifications are just lovely bits of data that will have absolutely nothing to do with your success. Good grades are something to be proud of (bully for you!) - but they don't really tell a SmallLaw employer anything more than "studies hard for exams." Do you know anything about personal injury law in your jurisdiction? Have you been reading recent appellate court opinions on relevant procedural and substantive law? (they're usually available, for free, on judiciary websites) Do you know anything about the sitting judges? Are you familiar with the differences between your local jurisdiction's rules of evidence and FRCP? (hint: there are plenty) Did you hold down a job while you were in school? (a summer internship is lovely, but it doesn't say anything about your ability to manage your education while working anywhere from 25 to 50 hours a week)

And, 9, I'm really not trying to diminish your accomplishments, it's clear that you've worked hard to get to where you are today, but you need a wake-up call about what you're really offering to prospective employers.

What's more, your condescending attitude ("willing to do personal injury work") has got to go. What lawyer in his right mind would hire someone deigning to work at their firm when there are tons of other people dying to work there?

Wake up, honey,

44 - Check your panties and tell us.

Ok, we've covered PI and ID. Please do a post on corporate work at small firms for those of us not wanting to kill every possibility we have of being able to return to BigLaw in a practice area in which we actually want to be.

Chicks have been sharting on dudes in Boston for years now. Nothing new.

Bevin Pukeliss

50- Bingo. There is a clear bias AGAINST hiring someone from a PI firm back into big law.

Let me take care of next week for you:

IMMIGRATION LAW: Work to undermine the rule of law every day. Find as many ways possible to keep your client in the country despite his decade-old removal order. Shrug your shoulders when the alien rapes someone. Declare ignorance about his illegal employment. Call anyone who supports the law "racist."

Repeat.

Any lawyer that fell foe #9's flame sould seriously have their law license revoked.
"NYLS, did well in moot court, summered with a non-profit.".
I used to wonder how lawyers could fall for nigerian scams. I now get yhat a majority of the population of lawyers, even "T14", are as dumb as the average cirtizen.

54 here. Forgive my tttyping. I hate my BB keyboard.

54 - Why do you insult the intelligence of the average citizen that way? Earning a J.D. is not an indication of being smart. Ask all these deferred folks.

9, I have to agree with 48 and others. The only way you'll ever succeed in a business such as PI is if you have intense, focused ambition, learned skills, and a tireless work ethic. Nothing about your current bona fides are proof of those qualities and you would do well restrain your self-estimation.

But, it's conceivable that you aren't actually interested in my officious evaluation of your resume and only need advice about how to negotiate your first job. The rule of thumb is: NEVER bring up money at the first interview but ALWAYS indicate that you are considering other employers (even if you aren't). Do not discuss money until after you receive an offer. Respond with a counter-offer, and feel free to suggest or imply (but do not lie) that the firm is in a bidding war with another prospective employer.

The employer is king in this economy but everything is negotiable.

Good luck.

54:

9 may have been written as a flame, but that doesn't mean there's any shortage of people reading this blog that could have written it in earnest.

I'm halfway convinced that you're Elie, based on your sparkling command of the Blackberry's 'keyboard,' but "tttyping" made me laugh (and I'm only modestly ashamed of that), and an ATL editor would post under their own name in order to grab credit for any actual witticisms.

It seems like everyone responding to 9 acknowledged that it could be a flame - and dont forget, the best flames are the outlandish ones that some other mouth-breather would actually write.

@ 30: because you have to in order to make rent and debt payments? A layoff derails your career for a long time, potentially forever.

59 = Roxana

I've got an itch up my ass. Is it ok for me to scratch it?

There is a mindset on this site that federal government work is some place you can just camp out. Like, if you're a top grad and laid off from Biglaw, the federal government will jump at you.

Federal positions, even entry level GS 11s, are some of the most competitive jobs anywhere. You are talking about hundreds of applications per vacancy. If you clear the HR monkeys and get an interview, and still have the idea that you are doing them a favor and its a slam dunk because you used to be in Biglaw, they will smell it on you and you will not get the job.

Just like people who don't love the law shouldn't go to law school, people who don't give a shit about public service shouldn't apply to federal positions. At least, not federal attorney positions.

57 - Yes, by all means, great advice to pretend they are competing. I mean, no employer in this economy would EVER suspect that is a line of poo used to try to negotiate a better deal.

In the small community where I work (roughly 200,00), the civil litigation bar divides itself between ID and PI. Of the two groups, I think the established PI lawyers make better, sometimes MUCH better, money. Most PI firms are either solos or comprise 2-3 lawyers with maybe two staff people.

In my job, I see the work of both sides in litigation. On the whole, the DI side does better law and, frankly, works harder.

You can get rich doing PI but you need some skills not all lawyers possess: You MUST be a solid judge of cases and clients. This is contingency work and you can put in two years on a PI claim only to get zero'd out because the jury sees that your client is a whining jerk or good-for-nothing liar. You MUST have enough charisma to "connect" with juries even when you have a bad hangover. The only way to develop that skill is to do a LOT of jury trials. That's one reason PI lawyers around here also often bid on criminal defense contracts. The experience is worth more than the resulting (tiny) fees. Finally, you must be absolutely confident of yourself. PI is no place for the risk-averse.

You also need to accumulate a war chest for the costs that, even though your client remains ultimately liable for, you WILL get stuck paying. Along these lines, a hard heart is always an asset in the practice of law. Once you've actually screened a dozen med-mal clients, your sympathy for "the little guy" will evaporate and good riddance to it! The resulting objectivity will make you a formidible PI lawyer.

I am a HLS grad at a V5 firm. A friend of mine went to a crap law school in Texas and started at a PI firm back in 1999. After a few years, he hung a shingle and made between 30 and 50K for the next couple of years. Five year out, he landed a wrongful death case that settled for six million dollars and he kept 2 mil. He used some of that money to advertise himself as a "wrongful death" attorney and he has since landed numerous similar cases. He has 10 lawyers working for him and he's pulling in roughly 5 mil a year. His net work is over 20 mil due to a few 8 figure wins he's had. 'Nuff said.

The actual work isn't that much different that insurance defense work, lots of motion practice and discovery, lots of work with experts and medical records; there is a different philosophy and a bigger focus on efficiency, but basically the same work. (I've done both ID and PI).

Two big differences are that it takes lots of working capital and lots of marketing to do will in Plaintiffs PI work. You go many months without payouts and then get a big one, and you never know for sure exactly how big it will be. If you can't live with uncertainty, it isn't the right work for you.

The other plus of PI is that some people like working for the "good guys." PI work is work with average people as clients and a lot of time is spent getting clients familiar with the process. ID work has very sophisticated clients who understand the process and getting clients takes a different kind of networking entirely.

As a long-ago law school grad, who sees friends' sons and daughters coming out and looking for work, I would have to say that, rather than settling for a PI job for $35 or $45k, new grads should look elsewhere.

If you're not at a big firm, just write off law school as an aberration, or a feather in your cap, and expand your search to the broader business community. Look at HR jobs or entry-level jobs that get your foot in the door at a large corporation.

In the general business world, if you show up on time and put in the effort, you will end up doing well financially. The same can't be said for PI attorneys. For every John Edwards, there are 1,000 so-called ham-and-eggers just trying to keep the lights on.

A lot of these posts assume that all PI work is the same. That is simply not true. There are good PI lawyers and bad PI lawyers, like any other field, and the good ones get the interesting, high dollar, challenging cases, earn the respect of other members of the bar, and make a very good living. The lazy or not so smart ones churn out slip and falls, and fender benders, and other routine sorts of cases by the dozen and are more claims adjusters than lawyers. Where you end up depends on your skills and your willingness to work hard, just like in anythign else.

A lot of these posts assume that all PI work is the same. That is simply not true. There are good PI lawyers and bad PI lawyers, like any other field, and the good ones get the interesting, high dollar, challenging cases, earn the respect of other members of the bar, and make a very good living. The lazy or not so smart ones churn out slip and falls, and fender benders, and other routine sorts of cases by the dozen and are more claims adjusters than lawyers. Where you end up depends on your skills and your willingness to work hard, just like in anythign else.

A lot of these posts assume that all PI work is the same. That is simply not true. There are good PI lawyers and bad PI lawyers, like any other field, and the good ones get the interesting, high dollar, challenging cases, earn the respect of other members of the bar, and make a very good living. The lazy or not so smart ones churn out slip and falls, and fender benders, and other routine sorts of cases by the dozen and are more claims adjusters than lawyers. Where you end up depends on your skills and your willingness to work hard, just like in anythign else.

A lot of these posts assume that all PI work is the same. That is simply not true. There are good PI lawyers and bad PI lawyers, like any other field, and the good ones get the interesting, high dollar, challenging cases, earn the respect of other members of the bar, and make a very good living. The lazy or not so smart ones churn out slip and falls, and fender benders, and other routine sorts of cases by the dozen and are more claims adjusters than lawyers. Where you end up depends on your skills and your willingness to work hard, just like in anythign else.

A lot of these posts assume that all comments should be only posted once. That is simply not true. There are good comments and bad comments, like any other field, and the good ones get posted multiple times and get lots of responses. The lazy or not so smart ones churn out lame shtick, mock confusion over accreditation, and whining about typos. Where your comment ends up depends on your skills and your willingness to work hard, just like in anythign else.

@ 67: what if we actually love the law? Still write it off?

73, if you love the law, you need to develop a love of something less toxic, such as cocaine or gambling.

67 is partly right, partly wrong.

If you went to law school to actually be a LAWYER, don't take a job in HR unless it is the ONLY way you can pay your bills and you have exhausted every other law-job-related avenue. The reason for this is simple: if you have a law degree, most firms and in-house legal departments aren't going to bother asking why you don't use it to practice law. Your resume will go straight into the "rejection letter" pile. Lawyers want to hire other lawyers with experience, or, if they're hiring inexperienced lawyers, they want to hire from an avenue they trust (like a reputed law school's OCI program). If you don't work as a lawyer right out of law school, most people will assume you're either flaky or weren't able to procure gainful legal employment. Neither is an assumption you want potential employers to hold.

67 is correct that you should avoid low-prestige work like PI firms, though. If you're having trouble finding a high-paying law job, find low-paying, but nonetheless quality, legal work. Go work as a public defender if you have to. The pay is shit and the work is exhausting and thankless, but you will get quality hands-on time in front of the court and with clients. That means EXPERIENCE, and that means you'll have a much better time of it when you're ready for biglaw. But don't open up your search to include any old kind of work unless and until you're ready to give up being a lawyer.

@ 65 - "your retarded"

9 - I found your comments to be hilarious.

I work for a small firm in a medium-sized Southern market. While the firm does mostly PI work, I was honest when I got here about my (lack of) enthusiasm for PI work. In the year or so since I've been here, I've been able to chart my own course somewhat, and I do a lot of commercial and government stuff that (hopefully) will take me somewhere better next. No, the pay isn't great, but I sign everything I write, from motions to appeals, and get to take depos and argue in court. Not my dream job, but not a bad deal either.

Like anything else, it depends on the firm. Is the firm a PI chop shop that just tries to settle out identical rear-end or slip and fall cases? If so, avoid. If not, though, it's worth a look--don't run away because the firm handles some PI work. There's nothing wrong with easy money.

9, I think that you should put all of the salient points in your cover letter, and then in that same cover letter make it clear that you won't settle for less than xxx dollars. Make sure, of course, that this figure is significantly higher than your actual minimum. This is what we call hard-line negotiating, and it requires a real shark to pull it off right. From your comments, you sound like a shark, so I bet you can do it.

But it bears repeating: In PI work, the rank of your law school, your class standing, your GPA, your clerkship or SA job, NONE of these things matters in the slightest. Even your disciplinary history is utterly irrelevant. All that matters, ALL that matters, are an active law license and the ability to turn a profit.

It doesn't matter what practice you're in (just as it doesn't matter what career you choose): the very best PI lawyers will be far more successful than 99% of biglaw minions, and vice versa. www.Goodsharks.com

I left big firm life for a small plaintiff-side practice. Best decision I ever made. The work is more interesting. I like my clients. I care about my cases. I have tried more cases in 6 years than any of the partners at my old firm have in 30. For me, trying cases is the best part of the job. Initially, I took a big pay cut, of course. The last two years, however, I've made more than enough to make up for the lesser pay from my first few years. Plus, I work less.

In sum, better work, less of it, and more money.

Good series. Please do one on estates and trusts.

68-71: You need to work on your comment posting skills.

(a) Wait for a while before re-posting.

(b) Refresh your browser before re-posting to see if your comment made it on to the site.

68-71: You need to work on your comment posting skills.

(a) Wait for a while before re-posting.

(b) Refresh your browser before re-posting to see if your comment made it on to the site.

A few things:

1.) The income/success of PI lawyers varies by region. The bulk of wealthy plaintiff's attorney's come from the "judicial hellhole" states down South.

If you're a PI attorney in the northeast or midwest, the juries are just so much stingier that it's very hard to become a truly successful PI attorney.

2.) As an older attorney, I see a lot of my friends' sons and daughters graduating law school and struggling to find a job. Rather than taking a job at a PI firm and making $45k a year, I think they're better off writing off law school as an aberration, or a mere feather in their cap, and seeking work in the corporate world - whether it be in an HR department (where the legal degree could be a plus) or entry-level. In the corporate world, just being competent and hard working is enough to insure a comfortable income. In the legal field, however, for every successful solo there are ten hardscrabble losers.

alright 84/85! way to go.

I am the true 84. The double post was not by me, but by someone trying to make me look bad.

I am the true 84. The double post was not by me, but by someone trying to make me look bad.

I practice PI part time. I spend less than 25% of my time in the office on PI cases yet I earn over $100k a year in fees for my firm. That's the gravy that provides my bonus at the end of the year. Often I settle cases where my fees are over $600 or $700 a case. Yeah, sometimes I get dinged, like the case where I worked 250 hours and earned only $15,000, but for every bad case I've had half a dozen or more good ones. $100k a year in fees isn't to difficult either, it's 3 $100,000 policy cases at a 33% contingency. I've got several on my shelf right now waiting to be settled. I spread them out so I can earn my keep around the firm. The cases I file are easy. I get some discovery, usually a summary judgment motion, and I get to prepare for trial. Virtually all my cases settle, I have yet to have one go to trial, to be honest. I don't even want to go to trial, no sense in wasting a week of my life for a $100,000 policy case.

However, the one skill I have is that I can analyze a case pretty well and pretty fast. Other people aren't as good at doing that. Occassionally I'm wrong, like I turned away a case that I thought was worth only $30k or so total and I just found out from another attorney that the most recent offer was $75k and they want to hold out for $150k. But I've also turned crap cases where old ladies fall into $100k fees for my firm. It's job security.

#86 and #90 are correct but there's another factor to be considered. How overlawyered is the locale? In 2008, NY State had 1 active, resident lawyer for each 130 residents. Arizona, in contrast, had one active, resident lawyer for each 508 residents. Most states fall somewhere between these extremes. It's a lot easier to winnow out the gems from the chaff if you get a lot to choose from.

If you're a plaintiff's lawyer in judicial hellholes like Arkansas, Mississippi, West Va, eastern Texas, etc; then you can pretty much write your own check because the state-court judges let you do what you want.

High end PI is also nothing to sneeze at, especially the drug and device medical malpractice.

91 - If I could only know one fact besides the size of a market, I'd want to see the advertising budgets of 1 - 3 of the largest P.I. advertisers. The ratio of attorneys to population is less important. The effect of saturation advertising is amazing.

The heaviest TV advertisers don't even assign the file to the attorney unless the "case manager" is unable to settle the case with the adjuster.

The most memorable case described to me by a DI during a depo break was a case that he recently settled with a "case manager" at a large TV advertiser for $ 6K.

Even he was repulsed because his self insured client had investigated the claim and authorized him to settle for $ 750K. (These numbers are NOT typos.)
He never even spoke with any opposing counsel and the case manager started at $ 10K.

Look, not to sound a little snoody, but who cares if you "sign all your work" and "try more cases in 5 years than most partners do in 30" if you make 1/10th the money. Unless you make it big at PI, which is possible if you are good and/or lucky, all that experience you get is useless for transferring to better things.

If you love your job, more power to you. And in the end, non-chop shop PI's could probably make a descent living in the long run. But your 5 some odd years of making 45k a year to maybe strike it big isn't worth it when even most mid-law places pay 3 times that their first year. And there is no guarantee you'll get your pay day. Just keep telling yourself how great your work is, I'll take my "dreary" job and the 160k and get out if its really that bad after i pay off my debt and have a nice little savings set up. And then go do whatever

One successful PI laywer said in his deposition, of course he had disciplinary actions and legal mal cases brought against him. He said all good PI attorneys did. It was a badge of honor.

Other PI lawyers I know were at bigger firms, but then were let go and they couldn't find that 2nd law firm gig so they started doing PI as a solo. They aren't very good but then, they didn't have to be.

I've worked against them and they are so unorganized and file sloppy pleadings and lame discovery, yet the judges seem to give them a lot of breaks and then more often than not, they make some money off their cases. Sometimes, though, they are misled by their clients and have to get rid of the case fast.

#91 here. I agree with you, #93, and that advertising is one of the things about PI practice that makes me cringe. Even so, I'd still advise any laid off BigLaw associate considering PI work to get the hell out of NYC.

As to the fact that a new BigLaw associate makes 3 times what a new PI associate is likely to make, that's true but it's also largely irrelevant since many of those BigLaw jobs are disappearing and won't likely return any time soon. Even if that weren't so, PI at least is open to 2nd tier grads which BigLaw isn't and for the most part never was

No risk, no reward! If you're thinking about personal injury law, I say: go for it.

I noticed that there is not a single comment from a real PI lawyer. Now there is.

Raise your hand if you've gotten a seven-figure verdict in a jury trial. OK, I have mine up. If it is so easy, why doesn't everyone do it? They can't.

Being a good PI lawyer requires the some skills that all law jobs do, and some that other jobs don't.

Analytical ability, writing skill, knowledge of the law- all attorney jobs require that. PI also requires charisma, being able to think on your feet, and a giant set of balls.

It is very results oriented. The jury says a number. Your ability to go to trial and consistently get a high number affects the settlement outcome on all of your cases.

It can also be a hell of a lot of fun. PI definitely requires a certain type of personality.

I work in a six lawyer firm, and the quality of life is very high. It is a family atmosphere.

There are good PI lawyers and bad ones. The bad ones are settlement mills with TV ads featuring flashing lights and sirens. Don't lump them all together.

PI can be very rewarding, fun and challenging. It has been ten years since I billed a client .1 for anything, and I'll never do it again.

re: 42 and all others with similar sentiments: Please start a "glib putdowns of ambulance chasers" thread and vent your spleen there.

For those interested in the actual topic, please be advised that not all PI lawyers are John Edwards - even in California. Over 20 years, I'd say about 1/3 are sketchy while the other 2/3rds are just trying to do a good job for their clients - which is about the same ratio of decent lawyers to jackasses on the defense side of the same cases.

PI's how a SmallLaw guy pays the bills. If you don't like it, go oil and flex your Ivy degrees and BigLaw snobbery in another thread - those of us who don't care what Bobo the Frat Boy thinks have actual business to discuss.