Barry Doyle Personal Injury Attorney
barry@fightingforwhatsright.com
312-766-4875
www.fightingforwhatsright.com
Welcome to Fighting for what's right, I'm Pam Jones, here with personal injury attorney Barry Doyle. Barry, take us behind the scenes, what happens when someone comes into your office?
So, actually taking a step back. Before they actually show up, we have a phone consultation with them where we have a discussion about what are the issues that they're interested in talking about, because, we don't really handle everything in my law firm. The only thing that we handle are significant personal injury and wrongful death cases. So, if it's something that it's the kind of thing where I'm really able to help them, then we set up a time and they come into the office. There's no charge for them coming into the office, and we have a long discussion about what happened, what happened as a result of whatever accident they were in, and then we hit upon a game plan.
Sometimes the game plan is that we're going to take the case on, and work the case up and really try to help them. And there are other times where I meet with them, and for whatever reason from a legal perspective, or for some other issue, I just can't help them. If that's the case, I let them know and tell them really why I'm declining to take the case on. But, if I take the case on, then we begin our investigation process.
So Barry, when you decide to take the case, let's just say you do, does that mean a lawsuit has to be filed?
Not really. There are some cases, which are suitable for being settled, pre-suit, without a lawsuit actually being filed. There are others where it's really not a case that's suitable for pre-suit resolution.
What kind of factors come into play when you're trying to make that decision?
There's a number of factors and it's going to really depend on the particular kind of case that you're going to take on. There are some types of cases where pre-suit settlements almost never, ever happen. If the case is one of those cases, then we go ahead, and after we do our initial investigation, make sure that the case has the kind of merit that the client said, then we go ahead and we put the case into suit. But, there are some cases where there is some potential that the case can be settled without a lawsuit being filed.
The kinds of cases that typical are amenable to being settled pre-suit are your simpler kinds of cases, your auto cases, your slip and falls, dog bite cases, things like that. We have more complex kinds of cases, those are ones which are really never, ever, likely to be settled pre-suit.
And what kinds of cases would you see that are never likely to be handled out of court?
Cases with more significant injuries are ones which very rarely are settled pre-suit. Then, you know, there are other cases where you need to do some investigation to make sure that you have everybody in the case who needs to be in the case. Having the ability to subpoena documents, to bring in witnesses for depositions, to get other records and documentation that may help you identify other sources of compensation, other defendants in the case, are things that are helpful and it's really part of doing a good job for your client and without actually putting the case into suit. You don't have, you know, those resources the ability to conduct an investigation that way. So you want to put the case into suit, to just make sure that things are being done right and that you're really protecting your clients interest properly.
Thanks Barry. This is Fighting For What's Right, with personal injury attorney Barry Doyle. For more information visit our website at www.fightingforwhatsright.com
Barry Doyle
Personal Injury Attorney
barry@fightingforwhatsright.com
312-766-4875
www.fightingforwhatsright.com
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