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Monday, July 25, 2022
By Michael Nichols
Categories: Michael J. Nichols
In law school, they teach you the basics of analyzing a “tort” case: duty; breach; causation and damages. In 23 years of practice, I have found that so many lawyers focus on those 4 things. They are important, but do not lose sight of the story. What I mean by that is the human being who has put his or her life in your hands to get justice in a case has a story.
Before I started practicing law in 1999, I was a broadcast journalist for about 12 years. I worked in radio -- a beautiful medium -- and then T.V. for 4 years after that, part of that time concomitantly in radio at Michigan State University Public Radio and at the Michigan Radio Network while I moonlit at the NBC affiliate in Lansing, WILX TV – all while I attended the night program at Thomas M. Cooley Law School. I learned a very basic life-rule in human interaction: everyone has a story. Some stories are really sad, some stories are awe-inspiring. Every … body … has … a … story.
This is a truism that I employ every time I sit across the conference room table or my desk at the Nichols Law Firm (and the Reynolds Law Firm before that) and I needed to assess what “justice” meant to this future client or current client. Every single person has a story to tell before they got in that accident that gave rise to their personal injury claim; before that fall because of someone else’s negligence that gave rise to their personal injury claim or before that surgery that gave rise to their medical malpractice claim.
Understanding that story and helping the client prepare to tell that story is critical to putting our best foot forward as a lawyer and client and getting that justice. Justice will never be perfect, but the pursuit of justice is your legal right. It is literally in the United States Constitution, forged over blood, pain and suffering about 230 years ago on the heels of our sacred Declaration of Independence and successful revolution from the yoke of a tyrannical monarchy that was the reign of King George III.
With that said, every time a survivor with an injury walks through our door and we decide to take your case, I start from the concept that we are going to go to trial and we are going to have to – well to put it bluntly – kick the ass of the defendant and his lawyer in the courtroom at trial. We must assume that we are going to trial.
If you take a case with the precept that you are just going to settle, you are short-changing yourself. You are not preparing. You are not reaching for the best result possible. All you are doing is preparing to settle. Think about that. Even though most cases ever filed in the post-modern history of America settle out of court – who do you think gets the better results – those who settle or those who are “ready for trial.”
I started this with a little bit about my own story. My name is Mike Nichols. You can see more of my story elsewhere on this web-page but I propose that we leave it at this: my own story is part and parcel of what makes me different as a trial-lawyer and why my story and your story can intersect to get the justice that you deserve.