Robert E. Cartwright Personal Injury Law Blog on Lawyers.com

There has been a lot of talk about tort reform and I was recently interviewed on a local news program discussing the topic.  I personally believe that it is important that the truth about tort reform be told by those on the front lines who see the reality of what is really happening.  

First of all, a tort is a civil wrong, meaning someone has caused harm to another and that the action falls short of being criminal, usually because of negligent or careless conduct.  Tort reform is the slogan used by the insurance industry and other corporations to take away your rights.

The insurance industry has spent, and continues to spend, billions of dollars promoting so called “tort reform.”  The goal of this movement is to take away your legal rights.  Therefore, the insurance industry, chemical manufacturers, big oil and others, falsely allege that juries are out of control and that there is a litigation explosion.

Study after study has shown that there is no litigation explosion and that the number of cases filed has actually not kept pace with the rise in population, when adjusted for inflation (Slate Magazine Tort Reform Study).  Slate magazine explores the myths surrounding tort reform and comes to the conclusion that there is no problem in the courts and there has never been a litigation upsurge, ever.    

The occasional large verdict happens, makes the news, and is wrongly cited as an example of a legal system run amok.  What you don’t hear about is the true facts of the case, and the truth that our system has checks and balances that corrects for these situations.

The McDonald's coffee case, which people still talk about years later, is instructive.  When the case was first reported the focus of the story was the verdict.  Few people know that the award was drastically reduced on appeal so that the plaintiff’s medical expenses were not even fully covered.  The corporate interests won, yet few people noticed.

The fact remains that the contingent fee is the ordinary citizens’ key to the courthouse.  The contingent fee allows the ordinary citizen to retain the best lawyer in the land for free in order to take on the most powerful interests.  Only if the plaintiff wins the case is there a fee paid to the attorney.

If the contingency fee arrangement is lost then most people will never be able to afford to hire a lawyer.  Thus the average citizen would be barred from suing a corporation or wealthy individual because they couldn’t pay for a lawyer.  No lawyer, no access to justice.

The insurance industry, corporations, polluters and others know that if it takes away the contingency fee that it can harm its employees, customers and consumers without significant consequence.

The facts:

1.  Contingent fee lawyers often invest large sums of their own money, and years of time on any particular case in order to properly prepare the case for trial.

2.  The vast majority of people net more in the end even after the fee, than if they tried to handle it themselves.

3.  Capping fees would make it nearly impossible for the vast majority of citizens to hire a lawyer because it would be too expensive to hire a lawyer on an hourly basis.

These are the facts that corporations don’t want you to know.  Since its objective is to make money at any cost, insurance companies and other corporations want tort reform so it can cut off the average citizen’s access to justice.  

Do not be fooled and do not allow corporations to put a permanent lock on courthouse doors.

See Rob talking about Tort Reform on Youtube: The Truth about Tort Reform

Robert E. Cartwright