Dietrich Law Firm PC Jed Dietrich How Much Does it Cost to Hire an Injury Attorney in Buffalo NY

Injury attorney Jed Dietrich is back and and he comes back with really good questions. Jed because you know there's an awful lot of people out there who probably feel like you know what I really could use a personal injury attorney but you know first things first I don't know how to pay one I don't know you know I mean obviously they don't know the ins and outs of filing a suit and how this is gonna be paid that might keep a lot of people from calling someone even if they have a very valid suit. That's the first thing that shouldn't keep them from calling a personal injury lawyer because we work on a contingency arrangement which means that unless the case settles for money we don't get paid. So we work for free on the case and I'm happy to do that and that's the standard in my industry.

The other thing that's very important Linda is that we generally work for the same fees so you can hire a lawyer who just got out of law school to handle your personal injury case whether it's a car accident or a slip and fall or a nursing home negligence case and you generally pay that attorney 1/3 and the disbursements come off the top and then you pay 1/3 or you can hire a lawyer with a great track record of many million in multi-million dollar cases and that lawyer who's got a great track record is gonna charge you the same amount as the lawyer who just got out of law school. So you want to be very careful when you or your family members are choosing an attorney because it doesn't cost any more to hire a lawyer with a great track record.

So if you're gonna you're gonna go out and get a product buy a product and it doesn't cost you any more why wouldn't you get the best lawyers you need to do your research, your homework before you hire a personal injury lawyer. And we'll take calls if you have a question this is a great time 644-9840. So does this mean Jed that if somebody comes to an attorney and says look I believe I have a case here and they spell it all out and the attorney says “All right let's start working together first things first we need a check right up front,” should that be a red flag? Absolutely. That shouldn't take place the only area of the law that that may take place and in my field the personal injury field is the medical malpractice area and the reason that is a part of that particular field of the personal injury world is because the medical malpractice cases are very difficult cases to bring And obviously the attorney will work for free but then there are other costs associated with bringing a medical malpractice case.

The problem is doctors in Western New York don't like to testify against their doctor brethren so it's difficult to get a doctor in Western New York to testify against a doctor in Buffalo. So what you need to do is you have to hire a doctor outside of Western New York perhaps in Virginia or downstate to come to Western New York to prove the case because you can't go to court with a medical malpractice case without proving that the doctor committed some form of negligence and those are difficult cases to bring forth. But the important point that I wanted to again stress is that it doesn't cost anything to hire a personal injury lawyer in Western New York I work on a contingency fee arrangement there's absolutely no shame whatsoever if you're rear-ended and you're injured there's no shame in hiring a lawyer. You need a lawyer to protect your rights and I tell every client who calls me if insurance companies were fair and they cut you a check for what was fair and reasonable I would not have a profession I mean people would not call me.

The problem is frequently folks will call me and say my own insurance company is supposed to pay my medical bills, my No-Fault company, and may have sent me to their doctor who says that I can work and I don't need any more treatment and I can't work and my doctor says I can't work what do I do? And very frequently they won't call a lawyer right away but at that juncture I'll get involved and I'll assist and attempt to overturn the No-Fault denial and to get the insurance company to pay the medical bills and the lost wages and then we start talking about the case in chief which is the case against the person who caused the injury, the person who rear-ended you or the person who caused you to have some type of an injury as a result of a car accident or perhaps an injury because of a slip and fall we’re in Western New York it's the winter time there's an obligation upon land owners, people who owned properties business keepers to keep their walkways in a safe condition.

I mean we live in Western New York it's a great day to be a Buffalonian in Western New York the sun is shining here today but we've got a storm coming in the next couple of days in every business owner including myself and my family, we own a family business we get out there and we train our staff to make sure the salt is there and we clear the walkway so that the folks who come in have a safe ability to get into our properties and in our businesses and living in Western New York I think it's a great place to let the people in Western New York are the best and you can't beat the people in Western New York I was out in Utah for you know for some time and I spent some time practicing law there and practicing law in Buffalo. And my focus was always in Buffalo but it allowed me to see the folks there and the folks here and I liked the people there but you can't beat the people Buffalo I mean the Buffalonians are great. I don't think you'll have an argument there. Jed we have some calls for you. 

And good morning and you're welcome to talk with Jed Dietrich this morning. Hello, who's on first? My name is Clarence.

Go ahead Clarence please. How are you doing today? Good. I had an accident at work and I would like to know, by going on compensation can I get a lawyer to look into my case? That's a great question and typically the workers compensation claims if you can sue someone beside your employer. Let's say for instance you're a truck driver and you're driving down the road and you stop at a red light and someone rear-ends you in your truck your employer's worker's compensation carrier is going to pay for your medical bills and your lost wages but they didn't do anything wrong the person who caused your injury was the person who rear-ended you and then you do have an opportunity to sue that person who's at fault the person who rear-ended you that's one example. How about if the company did not have the right equipment for you to do the work with and you got hurt because they didn’t have the right equipment? Typically you cannot sue your own company in that type of a scenario.

However, there are other scenarios let's say you're a worker and you're delivering goods at a suppliers property or vendors property and the vendor did something and they didn't control the workplace or something fell on you and it wasn't your employer was at fault it was the vendor or the customer that you were supplying to then you could sue those folks but the best thing to do is to contact your workers compensation lawyer if you have one or you can contact my office at 716-839-3939 and we can walk you through it. Whether you have an injury or you can sue somebody or not I mean I give free consultations to everyone who calls my office. I'll sit down with you if I think there's enough of a case and as usual I give everybody my cell phone number I'm available all day long and you can call my office it goes right through to my cell phone and I would be happy to help you. Yah because someone will explain to Clarence why you can or why you can't and at least he’ll have an understanding of it.

Okay thank you for that call we're gonna move on to another. Hello. This is Carol. Go ahead please. I just have a question I don't know if it's a malpractice suit or if it is considered a defective part I've got a broken screw on my neck, the doctor did my surgery two years ago January and just about eight months ago when I re-had my x-rays done they found that the screw head broke. I was told by a local attorney that I've got a malpractice suit plus a defective part but he couldn't help me at the time. Yeah the concern with your problem ma'am is what are your damages? You've got a broken screw in your neck it sounds like you didn't know about that broken screw until you went in to see the doctor for a regular checkup if that broken screw isn't causing you any additional pain or discomfort that we can pin on the broken screw then you don't really have a claim that's worthwhile to pursue and again because we work on a contingency arrangement Linda, we're in it with you I mean if you've got a claim and it's valuable we're going to race after it and pursue it with vigor.

If you don't have a claim even though there might be someone at fault for your injuries we can't take that case because there's no ability to help you. And and I say folks call me all the time and say I've got a lawyer now I don't know if you can help me the first thing I say to them is I don't want to become involved unless I get all the information from you and I feel confident that I can help you - yes - because I don't want someone to come to me after they're disgruntled with another lawyer or talking to someone else and and say that all the lawyers are the same they didn't give me the time of day I mean I want to try to improve our profession so that folks feel a little bit better about the lawyers that you have. Not to say that you can't switch lawyers midstream because we’ve talked about that before. Absolutely you can. You can switch midstream and it doesn't cost you any more money to do it.

And if you're disgruntled with your lawyer or you have a lawyer who's not returning your phone calls it's important to try to contact that lawyer if you can't work it out then you're absolutely entitled to talk to somebody else. Alright Jed we're going to try and squeeze one more call in. Good morning. Go ahead please. Yeah, I had a cyst removed and the following day, I had to go in the hospital and I had this disease all of a sudden and then I spent five days in the hospital and almost died. My brother Richard said I'd get a lawyer if I was you. But there was other complications that were setting in also. Mm-hmm.

Again it goes to the that question goes to the difficulty of proving a malpractice case. In general the malpractice cases are when you're in the hospital you're treating with a doctor you've got other problems then there may be a negligence error. The question is what are your damages? If your damages are only being in the hospital for an additional couple of days and taking the antibiotics most likely those damages are not going to be sufficient to pursue a claim because the malpractice claims are significant. All right so there you go and that's just a few minutes of questions. You can imagine how busy Jeds day is but it's it's interesting and again it sounds like the best defense is a good offense or vice versa. Whichever it is. Don't go in without some -