Maryland Injury Lawyer Blog

Four passengers have filed a lawsuit in Alabama against Southwest Airlines, alleging breach of contract, negligent and reckless operation of an aircraft, and unjust enrichment. The essence of the complaint is that the company breached its contract with its customers by carrying them on planes that missed safety inspections. This is pretty much the same as bringing a claim against someone because their negligence could have caused a car accident. It is just far beyond silly.

As I have said before, while these lawsuits have nothing to do with personal injury cases, they have a meaningful impact of the perceptions jurors have of personal injury lawyers and their clients. The message is clear: no one was really hurt and everyone is just trying to make a buck.

Although I'm hardly an expert on the Maryland legislature, I look at some of the bills that impact Maryland personal injury lawyers and their clients that passed or failed in this legislative session in Annapolis and provide some commentary on them on the Maryland Lawyer Blog today.

My blog post on Thursday left the impression that Allstate had produced all relevant documents that plaintiffs' lawyers have been demanding. Apparently, after reviewing all of the documents, this may not be the case. Click here for the Time-Picaqune (New Orleans) article on what plaintiffs' lawyers say is still missing.

Back in January, I wrote about Allstate’s on going war with the state of Florida (and Missouri) in which it arrogantly racked up more than $4 million in fines for refusing to turn over documents that they had been ordered to produce and which had been requested by the insurance commission in Florida. On Friday, Allstate not only produced 150,000 pages of responsive documents it had protected as proprietary, but it made the documents available on Allstate's website.

In defending some of the documents, a company spokesperson said that many lawyers misinterpreted the documents that refer to how Allstate deals with claims from other parties, not from policyholders. The Allstate spokesperson said many of the documents, which had been picked apart by plaintiff’s personal injury lawyers, refer to claims-handling practices for car accident claims that have been incorrectly assumed to be applied to homeowners’ policies as well.

If this is true, I see Allstate’s point. Accident lawyers whine about Allstate’s bad offers in third party cases. In car accident cases in Maryland, I don’t think GEICO, Progressive, Nationwide, MAIF, or State Farm are making offers that are any different than Allstate’s. But that is not my point. The insurance companies have no obligation in third party cases to make fair offers. Insurance companies can do whatever they want. This is why we have lawsuits.

Moreover, the reason why insurance companies will not pay fair value on my accident claims is because two things have to happen before a bad offer turns into a lawsuit: (1) the accident lawyer has to be willing to file the claim, and (2) the plaintiff has to be willing to file a lawsuit and wait for their recovery. With respect to the former point, accident lawyers who fear filing suit rarely tell their clients they will not file suit. Instead, the lawyer tells the client that it is a great offer and they should accept it. The main reason insurance companies make bad offers is because lawyers let them. The idea that insurance companies – again in third party case – have an obligation to be fair is as absurd as the notion that personal injury lawyers should have the goal of being fair. In the adversary system, if your goal is to be fair, you are doing your client a disservice. This is not to say that you should not recommend fair settlements, but it certainly should not be a plaintiffs’ lawyer’s goal.

First party insurance cases where the insurer has a duty to their insureds to fairly provide compensation for their injuries or losses are a different matter altogether. In these cases, I think there is ample evidence that Allstate has failed to meet their obligations and I would not be surprised if these documents intentionally blur the lines between smart strategies in third party cases where the insurance company has a legitimate objective to pay less than fair value on claims and first party cases where the insurance company has a legal and ethical obligation to pay their insureds fair value for their claims.

Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse issued a press release today pointing out that, according to a new national study by the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest, many personal injury lawyer websites disguised as health care websites are jeopardizing the public health.

Two entities have been mentioned above. Like our local baseball teams in Baltimore and Washington these days, you can’ t tell the players without a scorecard.

Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse sound like a bunch of nice, good folks someplace like Iowa who want to fight abuses that concern our tort system. Using the word “citizens” really helps create that effect. In fact, Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse is a front for corporate America to limit the rights of product liability, accident and medical malpractice victims (probably in that order for this group). I could write a lot about their funding, but I think this will suffice: it is believed that Philip Morris is one of their biggest contributors. I have not looked at their website but I’m going to guess that’s not mentioned anywhere on there.

Center for Medicine in the Public Interest reportedly conducted the “study.” Now if you are not impressed by the title of this group, nothing will impress you. I’m picturing a bunch of selfless doctor sitting around with a lot of medical books and journals trying to figure out how to help people. Yet, when their director appeared on PBS’s NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, he was described – apparently without objection - as a director of “a group that receives funding from the pharmaceutical industry.”

Do we really need a “study” on this topic? I’m not saying these sites are not out there, I just have never seen any. The Internet is not such a behind the scenes world where we need a study to find out what is on it. Simply tell us the websites and what you believe is misleading about them.

One of their findings is that 65% of search results on two FDA-approved prescription drugs - Crestor and Avandia - were on sites containing biased or unverified, negative information. I can’t speak much about Crestor, but, yes, lawyers do have great discussions regarding Avandia on their websites. Most of them discussing the New England Journal of Medicine study on the problems with Avandia, which appears to indicate that Avandia significantly increases the risk of heart attack. I would be curious as to whether the Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse find information in the New England Journal of Medicine as “unverified negative information.” I think they would find the health risks of tobacco to be “unverified negative information.” This reminds me of the lawyer that objects to evidence as “unduly prejudicial” because the information is really harmful to the lawyer’s client’s case.

Look, make a list of personal injury lawyer websites that are pretending to be health care websites offering medical advice and opinions. Let’s look at those and evaluate whether they are misleading the public by pretending to be health care websites or if they are providing information that is incorrect.

In any event, the Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse accusing someone pretending to be something they are not is downright Spitzerlike.

According to a recent poll on jury duty, the answer is yes. Fifty-eight percent of those surveyed believe that a jury is fair and impartial all or most all of the time. Even more interestingly, half of those surveyed said they would expect a jury to give a fair verdict as opposed to a judge. Only 23% selected a judge over a jury (27% were unsure). In other words, by a margin of more than 2 to 1, we trust juries more than judges. Only 18% of African-Americans and 19% of Hispanics chose a judge.

Maybe our founding fathers were on to something with this whole “jury of our peers” thing. But I don’t think this is a knock on our judges. Instead, I think people would prefer to be judged by regular everyday people like themselves who are outside of the process.

In light of the recent Medtronic ruling and drug preemption cases pending before the Supreme Court, I would like to add one more question to the survey: Do you think a jury or the FDA is more likely to protect you and your family from a defectively designed pharmaceutical drug or medical device? Someone do this survey and send the results to the Supreme Court.

Thanks to the Florida Jury Selection Blog for the link to the study.

The Maryland Daily Record reports that a Baltimore jury awarded $82,000 to an 8-year-old boy who only briefly exhibited elevated levels of lead in his blood.

In May 2000, the boy’s level was four micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood. In December, his level rose to 29 micrograms. I am a parent of three small children and, as a defense attorney, have defended lead paint cases in Maryland. If my child had a lead level of 29, I would absolutely freak out. In this case, thank God, as quickly as the level rose, it fell. By December 28 the young boy’s level was 19. It fell to 12.6 in February and then down to 8.6 in March.

The Plaintiff’s lead paint lawyer conceded that the boy was doing well. Apparently, he was doing great in school and he tested in the 97th percentile for reading, but there is no question that lead harms children. Should the fact that the child is doing well be a defense? We know lead paint harms children and we know this child, while doing great now, had cognitive delays. Would he be in the 99th percentile but for the lead? So I think the jury’s verdict was probably very reasonable (although you would have to be on the jury to really render an opinion).

The lawyer who defended this lead paint case, John H. Doud, III, a solo practitioner representing the uninsured landlord in the case, made what I think was an awful comment after the verdict. Mr. Doud said the verdict sends the wrong message to landlords. He said the message is that "when your first tenant sues you, I would get into another business.”

This is not the take-home message from this case. There is not strict liability in lead paint cases. This little boy could only recover if his lawyer proved that the landlord had actual or constructive knowledge of the problem and did nothing to solve it. In other words, the landlord has to know that his property could cause brain damage to children and still not bother to fix the problem. This burden in lead paint cases is more stringent than general negligence claims. So, that is not the lesson to landlords about lead paint that should come from this case. Instead, the lesson is if you are going to be cavalier about exposing children to lead paint that is known to cause brain injury, you do so at your own peril. The landlord should pay the verdict and thank his lucky stars that Maryland makes obtaining punitive damages so unreasonably difficult.

The case of Titan v. Advance was decided yesterday by the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. Titan is a case where the Plaintiff alleged negligent repair of a roof that led to the clogging of a roof drain, which then resulted in the flooding of the Plaintiff’s premises on Eastern Avenue in Baltimore, Maryland, at Crown Industrial Park. After a three day trial, the jury found in favor of the Defendants.

As you might have expected, the amount of rain after the job was completed was relevant. Defendants introduced, over objection, a certified copy of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s weather reports from Baltimore-Washington Airport, which reported rain patterns at the airport between the day roofing work was done and the date of the flooding off the roof. Plaintiff objected that the weather at Baltimore Washington Airport on that day was not relevant because it was 10 miles from the site.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals, in an opinion by Judge Arrie W. Davis, found that the documents were relevant because the parties disputed the amount of rainfall. The court further found that in spite of the length of the documents, the jury could reasonably interpret the recorded rainfall amounts and no expert opinion was needed to explain the documents. As to the 10 miles between Baltimore Washington Airport and the site of the property, the court concluded this went to the weight of the evidence as opposed to admissibility.

Interestingly, the Plaintiff filed a claim with its own insurance company, Hartford, who paid some, but not all, of Plaintiff’s damages claim. Specifically, it did not pay all of Plaintiff’s business interruption loss. Plaintiff originally sued Hartford who prevailed on the always raised, but rarely used, affirmative defense of accord and satisfaction. As a part of the settlement in which Hartford paid a nominal amount, Hartford released its subrogation claim in this case.

In another issue of interest to personal injury lawyers, the question of when the existence of insurance can be introduced was also at issue. In most accident and medical malpractice cases where the client is being sued individually, plaintiffs want to get into evidence that the defendant has insurance to cover the claim. In Maryland, under Maryland Rule 5-411, generally evidence of liability insurance is not admissible. In this case, Plaintiff was cross-examined about its dealings with Hartford. Apparently, one of the Plaintiff’s agents made assertions to Hartford inconsistent both with Plaintiff’s contentions at trial and statements the agent was now making. The court found that the plain language of Maryland Rule 411 makes clear that evidence of insurance is admissible when offered for another legitimate purpose.

Certainly, the trial court did not commit reversal error in admitting this evidence. Usually the court will make every effort to shield the insurance issue from the jury by encouraging a stipulation that the statements were made, but still not disclose to the jury that they were made to an insurance company. In this case, given the context of the quoted testimony, it would have been very difficult to mask from the jury that there was underlying property insurance.

This is a worthwhile case for Maryland personal injury lawyers to read, both on the issue of admissibility of insurance, and with respect to the admission of weather reports, although the case does not break any new ground. You can find the Titan v. Advance here.

There is an interesting story today in the New York Times on the chief justice of the West Virginia Supreme Court, Elliott E. Maynard, and his relationship with coal-company executive Don L. Blankenship. Apparently, these two met “accidentally” in Monte Carlo in the summer of 2006, sharing several meals even as the coal executive’s company was appealing a $76.3 million jury verdict against them to the court. A little more than a year later, Justice Maynard was the swing vote in a 3-to-2 decision in favor of Blankenship’s company, nullifying the jury’s verdict.

Apparently a spokesman for the coal company said the whole thing was a coincidence. The two men were vacationing separately, although the spokesman allowed that they met occasionally for lunches and dinners. These men were photographed together on July 3, 4 and 5, 2006.

I don’t know about you, but I can’t tell you how many times I have been vacationing in Monte Carlo, randomly bumped in to a friend there, and then met with that friend at least three days in a row. This does not happen to everyone? Who knew? Do you people even have private jets?

In 2004, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia famously refused to disqualify himself from a case involving Vice President Dick Cheney, although the two were friends who had taken trips together. Justice Scalia contended that disqualification was not required because Mr. Cheney had been sued in his official capacity.

I disagree with Justice Scalia on this point. Actually, I think I disagree with him on pretty much every point where reasonable minds could differ. But at least that conflict was out in the open. So whatever you think of Justice Scalia’s decision, at least it was above board. In this Monte Carlo mess, no one knew until these pictures surfaced of these guys together in Monte Carlo.

Apparently, hundreds of West Virginia miners lost their jobs as a result of this decision. If you are one of those miners, how exactly do you feel seeing those pictures?

I read an interesting article in The Oregonian on Sunday discussing the growing phenomenon of jurors turning to the Internet for information while the jury is still deliberating.

The article was precipitated by an Oregon DWI criminal case involving reality TV star Matt Roloff (who I have never heard of and cannot muster up the energy to Google). The jury had been deliberating for more than four hours over two days when the jury foreman told the judge one juror had done research on the definitions of “implied consent” and “beyond a reasonable doubt” and another had researched the accuracy of field sobriety tests. Interestingly, the parties avoided a mistrial by allowing the judge to reach a verdict. The judge found that Mr. Roloff was not guilty.

There is no real solution to this. There is not the will or the funding to sequester jurors. As reports of independent research by jurors grow, the only meaningful response we are likely to see are judges making a bigger point of clarifying to jurors their obligations not to turn to outside sources. But, really, it is already pretty clear so I don’t think their making a bigger issue of it is going to do a whole lot of good.

Reading this article reminded me of a comment jury consultant David Ball made at a seminar that I had forgotten about until now. Mr. Ball said that jurors read the lawyers’ websites so you should make sure that nothing you have on the website would offend their sensibilities. I looked at our website again yesterday, wondering if our website had anything on it that I would not want a juror to see. I didn’t find anything but it is something that every personal injury lawyer with a website should keep in mind.

In March, I wrote a blog post discussing whether it makes sense for personal injury lawyers to videotape medical exams by the defendant's lawyer's doctor. Last week, the Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled that a plaintiff who is required to submit to an "independent medical examination" (hereinafter the more honest "defense medical exam") may videotape the exam.

In this case, the doctor had refused a plaintiff’s request to videotape the DME because (1) it would invade the privacy of others in the office; (2) it would be “annoying and distracting” to the DME doctor and his staff; and (3) it would interfere with the doctor’s examination.

Actually, these are not the doctor’s objections. These are the defense lawyer’s objections. The doctor was more than happy to allow the DME to be recorded as long as the defendant’s lawyer did not object. Moreover, all of these objections are silly. First, obviously the video should only be permitted to videotape the doctor’s examination of the plaintiff. Second, for $500 an hour, or whatever the doctor is charging, he should be able to bear a little annoyance and distraction. Finally, there is no reason to believe that videotaping at the DME would interfere with the examination.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court followed the wisdom of courts in Kentucky and Indiana, which permitted audio recording of DMEs, and found no reason why the logic did not extend to videotaping an exam.

What I learned from reading this opinion is a little more on the history of compelled medical exams. In the nineteenth century, the U.S. Supreme Court in Union Pacific Ry. Co. v. Botsford, 141 U.S. 250 (1891) affirmed the longstanding common law that compelled medical examinations in personal injury cases were “repugnant to a person's privacy and bodily integrity.” Obviously, that view has changed over time. I agree that the more modern view is the appropriate view because if a personal injury plaintiff puts their health at issue, it is fair game for the defendant to be able to have the ability to evaluate those injuries in the adversarial system. But it underscores that medical exams are not a right to which plaintiffs must blithely acquiesce without fair conditions and limitations.

Again, as I wrote back in March, while I think it should be permissible to videotape a DME, I question whether personal injury lawyers want to go down this path. While I would love to have a library of tapes of a given doctor’s DMEs, the potential harm might outweigh the benefits. I think it would force DME doctors to do more complete examinations than what is often an assembly line examination. Moreover, I think the DME doctor would likely maintain a nice guy persona during the examination. A part of the argument for videotaping is that with a videotape, the jury can see what a jerk the doctor really is. But how many doctors are going to come off poorly when they know they are being videotaped? An even graver concern is that you have not fully prepared your witness for trial testimony at the time of the DME, leaving him/her vulnerable to making poor judgments during the examination, such as overstating the scope of the injuries, or acting defensively or inappropriately with the doctor, who is more likely to be mindful of the impact of the videotape.

The Maryland Court of Appeals issued an interesting opinion last week on Maryland’s assumption of the risk doctrine in American Powerlifting Association v. Cotillo.

The Plaintiff, a Prince George’s County police officer, was seriously injured in a power lifting contest at Patuxent High School in Calvert County, Maryland. He brought a negligence claim in Calvert County against the American Powerlifting Association and the Calvert County Board of Education. Essentially, the Plaintiff claimed that his injuries could have been prevented by the two Patuxent High School students who spotted the Plaintiff during his effort to bench press 530 pounds. A Calvert County Circuit Court judge granted the Defendant’s motion for summary judgment on the grounds that the Plaintiff assumed the risk of his injuries.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals affirmed on all counts except the negligence claim grounded in allegations of improper preparatory instruction of the spotter. The court’s reasoning was that the Plaintiff did not know the spotters were improperly trained, and because their improper training presented an enhanced risk not normally incidental to powerlifting, Plaintiff could not have assumed the risk.

The Maryland Court of Appeals disagreed, finding that the assumption of the risk doctrine barred all of Plaintiff’s claims, because any person of normal intelligence knows or should know that one of the risks inherent in powerlifting is that the bar may fall and injure the participant.

Continue reading "New Maryland Assumption of the Risk Opinion" »

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that Allstate Insurance Co. will now fairly compensate thousands of Washington drivers for out-of-pocket medical expenses in a class action settlement. In 2005, Allstate was sued for arbitrarily limiting PIP payments for car accident victims. Allstate used Colossus to determine the average pay rate for a procedure in the geographical area and then paid out only 85 percent of what it found to be the average amount. To be clear, they did not pay what they thought was fair; they paid 85% of what they thought was fair. In an unrelated story, Allstate takes 100% of the premiums from their insured. This practice underscores the insurance company motto of taking premiums and denying claims.

If any of this sounds familiar to you, I blogged last week about a former Allstate employee’s testimony that revealed Allstate’s alleged systematic bad faith in a first party bad faith case in Kentucky.

I also blogged back in May about the newly strengthened first party bad faith bill that passed in Washington, which has much sharper teeth that Maryland’s new first party bad faith law, allowing for three times the actual damages incurred plus attorneys’ fees and expenses. I cannot help but wonder if that precipitated settlement in this Washington bad faith case.

The Maryland Daily Record yesterday reported on a $4 million verdict an Anne Arundel County jury awarded to the parents of a 5 year-old boy who drowned in the Crofton Country Club pool in 2006. The parents of Connor Freed filed suit against D.R.D. Pool Service, Inc, who managed the pool for the country club. The boy was at the pool with some family friends and was found floating in the pool after a trip to use the bathroom. The suit alleged that the pool was an adequately supervised by only one, 16 year old lifeguard with 3 weeks' experience. It further alleged that CPR was performed incorrectly and that a defibrillator should have been used. (D.R.D. filed a cross-claim against the family friend but the jury found him not liable.)

Interestingly, the parents' claim for the child's conscious pain and suffering was dismissed in a pretrial ruling. I do not know all of the facts but unless he was unconscious when he hit the water, I cannot imagine how there could not be a survival action for conscious pain and suffering.

The jury award was 2,000,706 for each of the child's parents. The 706 represents the child's birthday of July 6th. That gives me goose bumps. Regrettably, the real recovery will only be about $1,020,000 (plus an economic damages) because that is the cap for non-economic damages in a wrongful death case with two or more beneficiaries.

If you read Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer blog regularly, you are tired of hearing me say this over and over again. But this jury picked an incredibly specific number as compensation for these parents. Does anyone think this is an unfair award? If the award is not unfair, why does Maryland law cap damages in these cases? It is just wrong and this is one of those cases that underscores the injustice of Maryland's cap on non-economic damages in wrongful death cases.

Connor's parents have started the Connor Cares Foundation whose mission is to get legislation passed for pool safety standards and get a standardizes pool rating safety system in place nationwide. It is nice that these these parents are trying to achieve some good from such a tragedy.

I have three small kids and a swiming pool. My wife and I are pretty obsessed with pool safety. We have a lot of systems to ensure safety and I am still terrifed by the pool. Every time we start to let our guard down even a little bit, I am reminded of a chilling stat: it is safer to have a gun in the home than a pool in the backyard.

A man in Texas has filed a lawsuit against 1-800-Flowers for $1 million for telling his wife that he was cheating on her.

Leroy Greer’s Complaint states that he purchased flowers for his girlfriend through 1-800-Flowers. He claims to have specifically asked 1-800-Flowers to keep his purchase private. Mr. Greer claims he was assured that the company's privacy policy would protect him. Apparently, 1-800-Flowers pledges not to share personal information with "third parties." 1-800-Flowers sent a thank-you note to his home, and naturally his wife saw it and called the company which faxed her a copy of the invoice for the flowers.

Mr. Greer, clearly a insufferable romantic, sent along a note to his mistress that said, “Just wanted to say that I love you and you mean the world to me!" How sweet! After learning of the affair, Mr. Greer's wife demanded a $300,000 divorce settlement in addition to child support, according to Mr. Greer’s lawyer. Greer’s Complaint seeks $1 million for breach of contract and deceptive trade practices.

Under Maryland law of contributory negligence, if a Plaintiff is 1% responsible for his injuries in a negligence action, he cannot recover for any of his injuries. Maryland is one of only 5 jurisdictions (Virginia, the District of Columbia, Alabama, and North Carolina) that have this completely unjust law. There is another canon in law, the doctrine of “unclean hands” which requires plaintiffs seeking equitable relief must come with “clean hands.” In other words, they have not done anything unethical or unjust to receive relief. Yet another doctrine of Maryland law is the idea of assumption of the risk which states that you cannot recover in a negligence action if you assumed the risk by your own conduct.

These three doctrines do not apply to this case. But it is a shame because both would come in handy. This guy was cheating on his wife. Now he wants to sue the company that let the cat out of the bag. It is just plain frivolous.

Yesterday, I heard that one of the Rutgers women’s basketball players filed a lawsuit against Don Imus for his "nappy-headed ho" comment he made last spring. The Plaintiff, only one of the players, claims that Imus' characterization has tarnished her reputation.

I cannot decide which lawsuit is more frivolous. After Imus made his stupid comments, everyone and their mother has stood up and talked about how much character these women have shown throughout the controversy. Does anyone think for even a half of a second that this woman’s reputation has been tarnished? Actually, she is right, her reputation has been tarnished. But it is because she filed this lawsuit. As a potential future employer, how would you look upon this young woman?

I do not mean to attack this young girl because my in the blind guess is she is surrounded by people that led her in the wrong direction to a lawyer that just wanted to sue Don Imus and get a little attention. But both of these lawsuits are silly. This hurts personal injury lawyers and their clients because it increases the skepticism juries have every time a lawyer stands in front of a jury who has been legitimately hurt.

I wrote a blog post for the Maryland Lawyer Blog on a new opinion in Minnesota on their seat belt gag rule. After surfing around after writing the post, I found the oral argument for the case on line. The Internet era really changes televising courtroom proceedings.

I think this is a fantastic development. I also think Supreme Court arguments should be televised. Why not bring the biggest issues of the day before the American public? I know that some Supreme Court justices have expressed concern that televising hearings would result in justices to losing their anonymity (I could not pick Justice Souter out of a lineup, I'm sure) and that the media might use sound bites to misrepresent statements made by the justices. But aren't these the fortunes of public life? Why should the Supreme Court be immune? Whether I'm right or wrong, I think my view will carry the day eventually and we will see televised Supreme Court hearing in the next 10 years.

Justice was served in Roy Pearson's lawsuit against his drycleaner today. A District of Columbia judge ruled that Mr. Pearson would get somewhat less than the $54 million he sought in his lost pants lawsuit: less than zero (the judge awarded the drycleaners court costs).

Mr. Pearson had sued Custom Cleaners because Pearson said the cleaners lost an expensive pair of his pants. His lawsuit claimed that signs in the drycleaners that read "same day service" and "satisfaction guaranteed" were misleading to the consumers.

I've been meaning to summarize my thoughts on this case for the last few days but this Houston Chronicle editorial says it better than I would have.

A class action lawsuit was filed last week in Seattle, Washington against an internet lawyer rating service named avvo.com. The lawsuit claims that the service provides a misleading and inaccurate assessment of lawyers' abilities, and is in violation of the Washington Consumer Protection Act. According to the lawsuit, the website gave two Supreme Court justices the same rating as an attorney who was convicted for conspiracy to defraud the government.

According to the lawsuit, a Bellevue, Washington lawyer listed an award with Avvo he won last year for playing softball, which caused his rating to rise. Obviously, this award is unrelated to the lawyer's ability to practice law.

I have mixed feelings on Avvo, which has yet to begin rating Maryland lawyers. On one hand, I think many consumers, particularly unsophisticated consumers, need some assistance to make their decisions. These consumers need particular protection from lawyers who pretend to be personal injury lawyers but have never come close to trying a personal injury case before a jury. The problem is, however, that it is impossible to conjure up an objective formula to rate lawyers. This difficulty was clearly underscored by the lawyer whose rating increased by his ability on the softball field.