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Big insurance companies and railroads typically require confidentiality to protect them and their insureds from bad publicity which comes from severely injuring a worker or an average person and paying out big settlements.
Normally in my largest cases where I feel that I’ve done my very best work as a Virginia personal injury attorney handling catastrophic cases I cannot talk about it on the Internet or in the newspaper.
The idea is that the defendants in personal injury actions such as a car manufacturer that has developed a car prone to catching on fire in the event of an accident doesn’t want the public to know about the real risks and doesn’t want one plaintiff’s personal injury lawyer sharing information they’ve learned in discovery and investigation of a tragic death with other plaintiffs’ lawyers across the country. Many judges think that such personal injury settlements that require confidentiality are bad for the public and consumer safety. I agree with them.
What ends up happening is that at mediation I finally get the insurance companies for the dangerous truck company to offer full and fair compensation to my client in exchange for a release. The lawyers for the insurance company demand that confidentiality be a part of any agreement or else they will not pay the money. My client who may have a seriously injured child or a husband who will never be able to return to work is faced with a decision whether to agree to keep the information quiet or risk going before a jury trial and not getting full compensation.
For the family it’s an easy decision. They have to do what’s in their best interest. I as the personal injury attorney in a catastrophic case, am duty bound to make sure to get the best possible result for my client and that is the most important thing. Being able to share the information with other lawyers or being able to advertise about it on my web site is secondary.
For this reason confidentiality agreements have kept me from posting on my web site and letting other people know about some of the very best work that I’ve done. However that is the way the system is set up to protect insurance companies and big corporations.
JC
The Virginia Beach and Norfolk, VA personal injury law firm, Cooper Hurley, handles car, truck, and motorcycle injuries as well as brain injury, wrongful death, railroad workers’ injuries (FELA) mesothelioma and medical malpractice cases.
John Cooper grew up and was educated in Virginia Beach and handles many cases from the city. John Cooper and his partner Jim Hurley have more than 40 years of combined experience in handling personal injury claims.