For me, the courtroom is the place where David really can stand up to Goliath.
My clients, individuals and their families, have gone up against the largest health systems, the biggest insurance companies, the most bad-ass chemical company, the richest pharmaceutical company, and even the United States government.
After college, I started as a foreign correspondent and then an investigative journalist. For each article, I would conduct interviews and often review reams of documents. Often, my stories were about those in powerful positions who had misused those positions. Those skills gave me a taste for cross-examination.
For my final project as a journalist, I wrote a historical account of the Nazi war crimes trials in Germany, told through the story of one of the last major Nazi figures to stand trial. (For more on that, here is a write up on the book.) I attended the trial in Stuttgart, Germany and listened to the stories of Holocaust survivors who testified to the crimes the Nazi officer had committed. I saw just how much the law matters, how the law really is a means to a measure of justice.
When my book manuscript was completed and off to the publisher, I turned to the law myself. I found a way to channel my experiences and skills – writing, investigating, questioning, challenging – so that I, too, could help people achieve a measure of justice.
The cases I take often involve complex issues of medicine and science. A medical procedure that went bad. A devastating medication error that caused a brain or spinal cord injury. A toxic exposure that caused cancer. A product or drug that was defective and caused a serious loss or permanent injury. Of course, the goal is to obtain maximum compensation for the serious wrongs my clients have suffered. We have won millions of dollars in jury verdicts and have obtained millions more in settlements to achieve that goal. The goal also has to be to help the client achieve a measure of justice, to restore dignity and respect.
From the first meeting I have with a new client until the moment that person’s case is completely resolved, I always try to remember the road that led me to where I am and the reasons I do what I do.
