Full story in Law.com
By Alex Anteau
Georgia has long been near the top of the nation’s Judicial Hellhole rankings, and now, even some personal injury lawyers are starting to have enough.
On Friday, PI attorney, Darl Champion, of the Champion Firm, announced that he was resigning as chair of the State Bar of Georgia’s Committee on Attorney-Client Solicitation in a letter to bar president Christopher Twyman, which was posted to LinkedIn. According to Champion, the practice of case running, an allegedly illegal practice of soliciting auto tort plaintiffs before their police reports are made public, has gotten so out of hand, in part because the state bar has done nothing to stop it. In his words to the bar, he “cannot, in good conscience, remain in a position that has become a facade for action,” Champion wrote.
“The conduct is not just unethical, it’s criminal,” Champion said, alleging that case running violates O.C.G.A sections 33-24-53 and 15-19-55, which ban individuals from soliciting, releasing or selling information about the parties of a motor vehicle accident for financial gain. “Anti-solicitation rules exist for a reason. They protect vulnerable people from being preyed upon in their weakest moments.”
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The announcement garnered support from both the plaintiff and defense bar on LinkedIn, with some commenters remarking that the practice is also on the rise in states like South Carolina and Texas. Champion told the Daily Report the problem stems from a lack of enforcement by the state bar, noting that “When you don’t enforce rules, the worst of the worst start violating them, and then more start violating them, because they need to compete with the worst of the worst that were initially violating them.”
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“But when you’re walking into an institution that has certain processes and procedures and bureaucracy and people that work there that think a certain way, your hands are tied to a certain extent,” Champion said.
“That’s not a knock against the individuals who work for the state bar, because I think it’s largely a resources problem,” Champion added.