The Advocate, Journal of the Nevada Trial Lawyer’s Association, August 2005 issue.

Imagine, if you would, that during the recent publicity battles over the “medical malpractice crisis,” a local OB/GYN started running a Yellow Pages ad that said something along the following lines.  “Dr. Bigshot.  In the last ten years he has performed over 2,000 hysterectomies and has delivered over 1,500 babies.  On office days, averages seeing at least 50 patients per day.  Both he and his wife drive Mercedes 560 SL cars, and he also maintains a collection of vintage Corvettes as his hobby.  Has a twin-engine Bonanza plane, and maintains a million dollar second home on Coronado Island.  While most OB/GYNs earn only $400,000 net before taxes, Dr. Bigshot has earned two or three times that amount, on the average, in the last five years.”  How would that play to the public?
 
We have all seen the typical automobile insurance company ads.  The music is “down home” with banjo and harmonica, and blue-jeaned, plaid-shirted insurance agents talk about their down home values and service to customers.  The viewer is led to believe that these people are good, middle-class Americans; shucks,  we would resent them if they were not.  What if instead the insurance company ran television commercials like this:  “Bigshot Insurance Company.  Our gross revenue last year was greater than the gross national product of more than 80 countries.  Our top executives earned seven-figure bonuses and have done so for fifteen years straight.  Even though every other industry’s stock went down in the late 90's, the insurance industry’s stock index went up.  The vast majority of our agents make six-figure annual incomes, and we have more than 500 agents in the ‘million dollar a year’ net income club.”

 Well, the fact is these made-up advertisements sound ridiculous, because a doctor or an insurance company would never go to the public and brag about how much money he or it makes, or their volume of business.  To do so would be a public-relations nightmare.
 
The PR flacks for the doctors have commercials that depict doctors who, at least when they appear on TV, are middle-class all the way, cheerfully greeting elderly clients, playing in the park with small children and dogs, wearing the ubiquitous plaid shirt with rolled up sleeves and  blue jeans.  If any of them listen to music other than Aaron Copeland, or  acoustic guitars and harmonicas playing “family value” type music, you would never know it from the television ads.
 
As trial lawyers, we like to think of ourselves as the fellows who eschew the corporate types and blue-bloods; we’re for the little man, the common man.  We protect consumers.  Atticus Finch didn’t live in a fancy mansion; he represented poor people as a matter of justice.  We are, when we are at our best, driven by a sense of justice and protecting the rights of the little guy, against wealthy and powerful interests.  I may be naive, but I think that there still is, at the core of most of us, that core belief that there is something noble and important about representing someone who was truly hurt against powerful corporations and insurance companies; that the money that might be earned is merely a by-product of doing the right thing; that if we focus on doing the right thing first, the money will be there.  But – and this is the important point – it shouldn’t be all about the money.
 
Unfortunately, the forces who oppose what we do have been very clever in crafting various forms of publicity that have portrayed us all greedy  rich guys, who do not help the injured victims but rather simply profit from them.  I am repulsed by this portrayal because I have never been that sort of lawyer.
 
And I personally know some real “Atticus Finch” types.  Without naming names, I know of two different lawyers who turned down fees of close to a million dollars because it just wasn’t the right thing to do.  They worked for the victim for free and let the victim have all the money.  They didn’t seek publicity over their good deed; I only found out about what they did surreptitiously.  But these two lawyers, who want to be anonymous about their good deed, are a couple of my heros.  I’ll bet that there are many others out there who have turned down large fees because their real interest in the case wasn’t money, it was justice; they really wanted to help their client so much, they did it for free.  I think if someone wanted to brag, they should brag about something like that.  This is the sort of thing that we, as trial lawyers, should publicize.
 
Unfortunately, I see some lawyers doing what I think is a very bad thing to our image,  and that is advertising by bragging about how much money they make.  I suppose there is some part of the population that might be impressed by such an advertisement, but I really question how effective such an ad might be in attracting business.  What I do know, for sure, is this: lawyers who want to advertise about, or brag about, how much money they make, send out a message to the public at large (i.e., the jurors who sit in our courtrooms, the newspaper reporters who write stories, the judges who sit on the bench hearing the case) that even though we say we’re about justice, the truth is, wink-wink, we’re just about the money – lots of it.  Lawyers can do the forces that oppose us no greater favor than to crow about how much money they make.
 
I know of at least one trial lawyer who is, as far as I know, one of the  most successful trial lawyers in the state.  Yet, from the way he dresses, from the car he drives, from the way he acts, you would never know it.  He never advertises about the settlements and verdicts he has obtained, although I know they were quite large.  I would say that this particular fellow is better known from the  acts of public service and charity he has done, as opposed to how much money he made.  I know that a lot of his money has gone back to many worthy causes in the way of charitable contributions.  Yet, he does not seek newspaper stories about himself in this regard.  Not everyone has the talent or personal sense of self worth to be like this particular lawyer, but we can perhaps all strive toward that.
 
The truth is, the large majority of lawyers representing individuals don’t make large amounts of money.  The vast majority of attorneys that belong to the Nevada Trial Lawyers Association make money that  would certainly not amaze anyone.  The fellows who do make large amounts are generally men or women with extraordinary ability, and as in any profession, the top three or four percent are going to make a lot more than the rest.  But, I think the public perception is that all trial lawyers are greedy ambulance chasers who must all have lots of money.
  
It has been my policy as the editor of the Advocate to turn down persons’ requests to print various settlement reports.  The reports are oft times along the line of what seems like a case with virtually insurmountable problems, then, surprise, through clever lawyering  a big settlement is obtained, seemingly at odds with what one  would think would otherwise have been the outcome.     I think that the negative inference of such reports outweighs the possible positive educational benefits (which, in the case of such  settlement reports,  are minimal.)
 
I view printing articles about trial verdicts as being different.  I think, at least on a professional-to-professional basis, an informative article about a trial, and its results, can have a professional application beyond  bragging rights.   Even here, I think the “can you believe how I got this verdict going against these odds; boy am I good,” type report tends to send exactly the wrong message to others. 
 
I know the views expressed in this editorial are not shared by all trial lawyers.  I have heard, “If it’s the truth, it’s not bragging.”   But, I would like to think that there are means to convey one’s accomplishments without perpetuating the Karl Rove stereotype.