Embarking on another trial

Well, I do not yet have reasons from my last trial and I am about to commence yet another trial, which is scheduled to start tomorrow morning.  

It is always interesting on the night before the start of any trial.  Mentally, I am tying off loose ends.  Making sure that I have learned lessens from past experience and executed on that knowledge.  Making sure that I am leaving as little as possible to chance.  Given that this weekend trial preparation coincided with NFL play off games, I cannot help but think that it must be how the head coach of a football team feels before a game.

Personally, I like to pay a lot of attention to my game plan.  However, just like a football game is played on the field, a trial occurs in a courtroom and it is a venue where unexpected things can occur.

When I was in my early 20s, I recall an older friend of my reciting to me:

Luck is simply preparation meeting opportunity!

Another win for the McComb Witten trial team

In October 2012 the McComb Witten trial team of Etienne Orr-Ewing and Meghan Neathway put together a solid case for a wonderful young woman.  Recently, Justice Voith published his reasons and our client was ecstatic with the results.

Link to the great McComb Witten trial result

Congratulation to our client.  It takes tremendous courage for an injured person to take a case to trial.  You are going up against the best lawyers that ICBC can bring to the table.  ICBC has seemingly infinite resources to scour your life to try to make you look dishonest or like you are hiding something.  The tables seem slanted in ICBC's favour, because if they lose it is just the drop in the bucket of a billion dollar insurance company.  If you lose, then it means that your entire claim might be lost or even worse...you might be left owing money to ICBC.  So, it takes courage.  Courage in your conviction.  Courage to trust your lawyers to help you tell your story. Courage to know that when put on the stand you will know how to respond when you are getting grilled by the ICBC lawyer.

Having a trial team that knows how to get results and knows how to put a case together for trial is essential in giving you the courage to take your case to trial.  

The reality is that somewhere between 1-4% of cases go to trial.  You probably do not want to go to trial! So you might ask, "Why is it so important that I have a great trial team?" The answer to that question is found in my last post.  The value of your injury claim is whatever the insurance company is prepared to give you or your alternative to a negotiated settlement which is trial.  Having a great trial team helps you with both.  The more the insurance company knows, fears, and respects your lawyer, the more they are going to offer you ahead of trial and the more likely you are going to be successful if you actually do go to trial.

If you found this post because you have recently been injured and are looking for a lawyer, then you are in luck.  ICBC seems to be a broken company (see my earlier post on the subject).  For some reason, they seem to be avoiding early settlements and pushing injured people further and further through the litigation process.  More and more cases are going to trial.  Lawyers, whether at our firm or others (if you can find a good one), are doing more and more trials.  Getting better and more efficient at running cases to court.  Trial is often described as a war and your soldiers are getting battle hardened!

The reality is that by the time your case has worked its way through the system, ICBC will have smartened up its ways and you will have a lawyer on your side that has earned the privilege of respect from ICBC by getting results in the courtroom.