In my recent book titled “Minority viewpoint – my experience, as a person of color, with the American Justice System” I describe a true story about a legal case to fight against defamation. One of the key areas I discuss in this book has to do with my interactions with the legal community, which includes lawyers, law firm management, as well as lawyers professional responsibility board.
Unfortunately my experience with the legal community in this situation has been rather disappointing. There are several things that were extremely surprising to me:
- The lawyers do not seem to want to give out a reliable cost estimate. I wonder if it’s possible that they think that if the client is given a realistic cost estimate then the client may decide not to pursue the lawsuit, which would mean loss of business for the lawyers.
- They also seem to believe that it is not possible to give a realistic estimate. I believe that it is possible to provide a range of estimate to cover possible uncertainties. That would be very helpful for a client.
- They also do not seem to take any responsibility for a negative outcome of a case. My observation is that there is an “it is what it is” attitude or a “that’s how things work in the legal world” attitude.
- I was also surprised to note that the law firm management was certainly not interested in hearing about complaints against a lawyer – I felt they were more interested in defending rather than truly listening and understanding the issues from a client’s point of view.
- Finally I was disappointed in the manner in which my complaint to the board was handled. I was shocked to find out that the board did not even want to have a discussion with me to truly understand the issues before deciding not to investigate the complaints.
I believe that with a slightly different approach the legal community can be significantly more responsive to the general public.