DirtyLAWndry reader - “Greg” - thinks that his boss deserves an honorable mention on the site. Here’s why:

“I work at a small firm in Philly as a paralegal. My boss is one of those annoying personal injury attorneys that advertise on tv with paid actors. He thinks these commercials make him a celebrity. He’s a slime-ball. First of all, he pays cops, cab drivers, ambulance drivers, and hospital personnell to give him information about potential new clients when there’s an accident or slip-n-fall. He’s always forcing us paralegals to go to the hospitals and basically pass out his cards or go into patients’ rooms and offer his services. I thought this was something that attorneys weren’t allowed to do. We’ve complained about this to the other attorneys at the firm because I was told that attorneys have an ethical duty to disclose this kind of information to the disciplinary board. Well, the other attorneys have done absolutely nothing, even though they know this is what’s going on.

Someone in my office found out that non-attorneys can contact the disciplinary board anonymously. A few of us figured that this would be the way to go because we certainly didn’t want to risk our jobs over this. The disciplinary board posted on their website that he was going to be disciplined and they had a link to his offense…for a second. Suddenly, now his record is clean as a whistle on the website. Apparently, the ethics committee must have been paid off or he has something on them. There was never any disciplinary action.

The ambulance-chasing issue wasn’t the only thing that we complained about either. He also has a habit of using client’s funds for his personal expenses, like trips to the Galapagos, spa treatments, wining and dining his runners, etc. He’ll tell clients they can pick up their checks on a certain day at a certain time, but we never have enough cash to cover the checks. So, when the checks bounce he tries to charm them with his “celeb-status” and just gives them the run-around. Now, I know for a fact that quite a few of these clients have complained also but still he has a clean attorney record.

Lastly, he’s been cutting back on our pay. He claims it’s the only way that we can stay open. We don’t believe him because we’re still getting a good number of new clients daily. His retainer fee is pretty high and most of our cases either get settled or arbitrated for $50K. So, we’re doing pretty well considering there are about 30 new cases every single day. That’s not bad for a small firm. Plus, he and his partner haven’t taken any cuts. I know it sounds like I’m complaining when I should just be grateful to have a job, but he’s getting away with a lot of stuff and it seems like no one wants to do anything about it.”

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