Legal Malpractice Leads to Irrevocable Harm in Tennessee

By Thomas Greer | October 7, 2013

If you took steps to retain legal counsel to protect your rights in Tennessee, then it is likely that you had a compelling need since the average person does not seek out lawyers simply for fun.  However, things may have gone wrong and you find yourself wondering if an attorney’s error is the reason for your current position.  The fact is that lawyers can, and sometimes do, make mistakes.  Many times, these errors can be fixed before they cause any considerable amount of harm.  However, if this did not happen in your case, you may want to consider a legal malpractice case against your former attorney or law firm.

Attorney errors can lead to harm in any type of legal action, from real estate transactions, to personal injury claims, to patent infringement cases.  A legal malpractice cause of action may arise any time a lawyer has negligently provided legal advice or ineffectually represented the interests of his client.  There are many different errors that can lead to a malpractice claim, including:

  • A lack of knowledge of the law or failure to apply it properly;
  • Insufficient investigation into the facts of the case and inadequate discovery;
  • Breach of fiduciary duty owed to the client;
  • Failing to file the legal action before the statute of limitations has run;
  • Having a conflict of interest;
  • Failing to ascertain the client’s goals and failing to follow the direction set by the client;
  • Neglecting to inform the client of legal options of failing to get the consent of the client to take a particular action;
  • Providing improper or misleading legal advice;
  • Acting or failing to act in a manner that leads to the dismissal of the case; and
  • Billing the client for work that was not done or otherwise falsifying the clients’ bills.

Cases such as legal malpractice actions are particularly difficult because the plaintiff has to show that he would have had a more favorable legal outcome but for the mistake of the attorney.  Therefore, the client’s advocate needs to focus simultaneously on two different areas, the legal malpractice action and the underlying case in which the lawyer made the mistake.  In order to demonstrate the attorney’s error, it will be necessary to re-introduce evidence and recall witnesses.  The jury will have to decide that a mistake was made and that it was critical enough to have harmed the client.  Many times the harm was not the complete loss of the case, but a diminishment in the award made to a client, so the judge or jury will need to decide the value of the loss.

A legal malpractice case requires an experienced attorney who understands the best way to present the underlying case as well as the one involving lawyer error.  Discovery plays a critical role as it is necessary to find the facts that will convince the jury that the client would have succeeded or been in a substantially better position had the original attorney done a better job.

It is important to find an experienced lawyer who has the skill to create an effective legal strategy in the legal malpractice case and understand how to demonstrate that the client would have had a successful outcome in the underlying case.  The knowledgeable Tennessee legal malpractice lawyers at Bailey & Greer have the expertise to get justice for clients who previously have been denied the outcome that they deserved as the result of attorney error.  To schedule a free and confidential consultation, please call us at 901-680-9777.  At Bailey & Greer, we are small enough to care, big enough to fight, and experienced enough to win.  We look forward to providing you with superior legal representation.

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