When I decided to become a lawyer, I truly was not aware that many people despise our profession. It has only come about in the last few years with the heated debate over tort reform that I am getting more of an appreciation on the subject. To make it worse, I am of the particularly vile breed of lawyers known as the “personal injury attorney”. Some call me an ambulance chaser. I don’t know why, because if anyone spent any amount of time with me, they would know that I have never once chased down the street after an ambulance. They would know that I am not a money-grubbing individual who trolls around looking for hapless victims from whom I can squeeze a fee. They would certainly know that I have never filed a frivolous lawsuit and I have, in fact, booted clients out of my office if I felt they were faking their claims.
I know I am only one of many personal injury attorneys, and I know that there are some out there that give us a bad name. But I can tell you, those people are few and far between. Most lawyers I know, particularly the ones that practice personal injury, do so because they truly love helping people. However, we are the easy targets of a media campaign by the insurance industry to portray our jobs as ridiculous and unnecessary. I do not have the money or the standing to be able to fight against the insurance industry’s billions. All I can do is hope to convince one person at a time that lawyers are needed and should be revered because of their efforts to help the average man have access to justice.
