re: YouTube series focuses on the Louisiana trial lawyer scam

Johnny the Lawrence

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I think the solution involves, in part, limiting the communication and negotiations between personal injury attorneys and doctors.

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So it occurred to me that if we ever go the route of single payer medical in the US, it will adversely effect these high medical costs underlying these settlement demands.
Under single payer, doctors would not work under the same profit motive. They’d be employees of the state. They’d be salaried. The cost of medicine and procedures would conceivably come way down.

That must be problematic for the left leaning policy makers who support the plaintiff lobby and single payer healthcare.
Interesting to contemplate

Hold on there chief. LWCC was created in 1992 because NO carrier in their right minds would write Comp in this state. Why? Because of the same damn reasons we see today that hardly any auto carriers will write commercial auto in this state- the POS trial lawyers. LWCC has so much surplus right now because they are a pseudo-state entity (but a Mutual insurance company) and do not pay taxes on premiums or surplus like every other carrier in this state is required to do. They have stockpiled a shitload of surplus over the years because of this fact, and instead of paying taxes on it at the end of the year, they give it back to policyholders.

They don’t keep it all, they have to have surplus to pay claims. They declare dividends at the end of each year and give back a percentage.

Yes, in this case. Lwcc is a well run state organization, but it is a also mutual company. They are a Wards Top 50 insurance carrier along with the likes of Allstate, Chubb and other big boys.

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Isn’t this Champerty?

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I have to confess that I don’t know what Champerty is.

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Google says Champerty is an illegal agreement in which a person with no previous interest in a lawsuit finances it with a view to sharing the disputed property if the suit succeeds.

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Oh. That’s a bit different from what I’m talking about but certainly within the realm of the definition.
I know several guys that got loans based on collateral backed by a future settlement. Without that settlement potential (or certainty in Louisiana), these guys would have never qualified for a loan like this. One of them bought a wave runner and posted pics on social media of him on the river. He can’t be too badly injured and these pictures will come back to bite him.

There is another larger practice where people invest in class action lawsuits. I don’t have any personal experience in that but have heard of it.
These are not loans but actual financial backers that take a stake in the outcome. I didn’t think it was illegal though.

I've watched a plaintiff attorney agree to pay his client's electricity bill so his client would hold off on taking a low ball settlement offer.

Yea. I'm good with those.

Paying for a jet ski, I may have an issue with, but I think those are rare, to the extent they exist.

We don't agree to the JG Wentworth stuff as it arguably facilitates the client entering into a loan above the rate of what the Supreme Court allows.

Some other misinformation here:

It's not a loan that the client can draw on willy-nilly. It's a master line of credit the firm has, a loan taken in the client's name under that master line which the lawyer has final say over draws, and the law firm guarantees the loan. The client can't just walk into the bank and take out the loan for a new TV. If the case goes bad or your client is pictured on the jet ski and gets zeroed, the law firm still has to pay it back.

The Supreme Court has issued strict rules for what can and cannot be the basis for a loan.

Rule 1.8 LINK

ETA: And I'm not sure if you meant to tip your hand or not, but this is incredible and exactly why the Supreme Court allows financial assistance to clients:

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I've watched a plaintiff attorney agree to pay his client's electricity bill so his client would hold off on taking a low ball settlement offer.

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So your honorable and venerable insurance adjuster who always acts in good faith can't just simply starve out a family whose breadwinner is out of work until they accept whatever peanuts thrown their way.

I agree that Morris and Gordon and the mills take advantage of the threshold. Yes.

A clean two year prescription for lowering of the threshold would have been a perfectly acceptable compromise.

LABI got greedy and tried to grab too much.

But you bring up an interesting point. Not only did LABI not agree to guarantee a rate reduction if tort reform passes, they wouldn’t even let bills addressing underwriting and regulatory procedures get out of Committee.

Why is that?

Yea. I was good with those type loans or advances. I should have been clearer. I was just bringing up an example I've personally experienced that I think a lot of people would be shocked occurs.

I'm a defense attorney, but I'm reasonable. I don't drink the Kool aid on everything.