Attorney Jane Leger – No Such Thing as an Accident

Ferguson Law Firm Attorney Jane Leger explains the importance of a trial attorney.

I do not like to use the word "accident" in the practice of law, because I have found that there is rarely such a thing as a true accident. Accidents where people are harmed or hurt badly, in my opinion and based on my experience, are always the result of choices that were made not to follow safety rules that were in place. The reasons are various: sometimes the company is trying to save time and cut corners so they can get more product out the door — and we all know product means profits. Sometimes companies cut corners because they don't want to spend the money for a safety guard or to implement safety procedures. But when we look at these catastrophic injuries that occur, we can usually identify not just one but several safety rules that were broken.

One of the things I talk to our younger lawyers about a lot — because I had some really good lawyers mentor me — is the scope of what we look at. The companies always want to focus on the last few seconds or minutes before a person was injured. We go back days, months, and sometimes even years, and we find that the company made bad choice after bad choice after bad choice, motivated by greed, and that those choices stack up over time and lead to the bad things that happen within those final minutes or seconds.