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My Lawyer Screwed Me
Your lawyer may not live up to your expectations because lawyers sometimes make mistakes because of a number of factors. If your lawyer screws up your case and the lawyer’s mistakes have caused major financial losses, you may want to start thinking about your legal options.
You will need another attorney with experience in legal malpractice to review you case and help you determine the actions to take. Legal malpractice is a tricky thing and your lawyer may only take up the case if your former lawyer’s actions constitute malpractice and your claim is worth pursuing.
Legal Malpractice Case
A legal malpractice case is not easy to win for two reasons. First, you will have to prove that the lawyer was negligent or messed up in some way. Secondly, you have to prove that you would have won the case if there was no negligence. You need the following to win a malpractice case against your former lawyer:
- It was your attorney’s duty to act professionally (duty)
- The attorney breached that duty by being negligent , making a mistake and so on (breach)
- The negligent behavior caused you damages (causation)
- Those damages led to you experiencing financial loss (damages)
A malpractice is likely in situations where the attorney-client relationship is poor. Troubled attorney-client relationships emerge when there is a lack of communication, inadequate legal work, dishonesty and incompetence, arbitration and billings. Up to 11.3 percent of malpractice claims is “failure to know/apply the law” according to the American Bar Association. The types of errors include:
- Failure to file documents
- Failure to know deadline
- Failure to obtain client consent
- Planning errors
- Inadmissible discovery
These are just a few examples of the common types of errors. But sometimes a lawyer may engage in activities such as misusing your money, lying to you and the judge, failing to show up in court and getting involved in crime. File a complaint to the agency in your state that is responsible for disciplining attorneys if you lawyer has engaged in such activities.
Your Rights
You have the right to a proper and effective correspondence between you and your attorney. In addition, your attorney should have the core knowledge and expertise of your legal issue. The attorney’s work must be ethical and the attorney must bill you correctly. The lawyer should do the following:
- Guide you on your legal issue
- Always Keep you up to date about your case
- Be open with you about how your case will go
- Tell you how much your case could cost
- Make sure you make all the vital judgments about your case
- Communicate with you adequately
- Keep you informed about any changes, delays or set-backs
- Provide you with the information you need to make educated decisions and more
These are just some of the expectations you should have when you are dealing with an attorney. However, you can always fire a lawyer that you feel isn’t competent enough for your case instead of waiting to sue if you lose the case. Going after a lawyer for negligence is not easy. That is why you need to get the best representation at the initial stages of your case to make it more likely not to lose the case.