The L word

[Watcher55]

I have this habit of looking three steps ahead an' I got to wonderin' at what point is it wise, or appropriate to start thinking about hiring a lawyer at least in an advisory capacity? What should I look for in a lawyer...? Purty much the same questions people ask when they're lookin' for an agent (the hows the whys the wheres)

I don't guess I need you to answer this outright but if you can point...well I'll just go that way.

Thanks.

[siebendach]

You should consult a lawyer when you are about to make a business commitment you can't easily undo. (This includes going on the attack.)

You should consult a lawyer if you are under attack yourself (sued or arrested).

As for what you should look for:

A) I prefer small firms to big ones (or solo practitioners). With a big firm, unless your case's ratio of reward over risk is high, the lawyers there may repeatedly pass your case down the food chain. As for solo practitioners, I find they are often overburdened.

B) Depending on what you want the lawyer for, that lawyer's knowledge of your case's subject matter (i.e., medicine, publishing, or the prosecutor's style) may be a lot more important than that lawyer's knowledge of "the law".

C) Before you hire an attorney, try to check your state's online case record to see if that attorney has ever been sanctioned by your state's Grievance Committee (or successfully sued for malpractice). If the attorney was sued once for malpractice, but that case was dismissed, the attorney may still be good.

[Nathan Bransford]

I have this habit of looking three steps ahead an' I got to wonderin' at what point is it wise, or appropriate to start thinking about hiring a lawyer at least in an advisory capacity? What should I look for in a lawyer...? Purty much the same questions people ask when they're lookin' for an agent (the hows the whys the wheres)

I don't guess I need you to answer this outright but if you can point...well I'll just go that way.

Thanks.

I don't have a lawyer so I don't know that I'm the best person to be dispensing advice on what to look for! In general I don't know that you necessarily need a lawyer in day-to-day capacity as a writer, unless something sticky comes along the way.

[polymath]

Call up a nearby intellectual property rights law firm and find out what, when, where, why, and who they represent? It couldn't hurt to ask, or cost to ask.

North Pursell Ramos & Jameson, PLC, Renee Stewart, Nashville, Tennessee
http://www.lawyer.com/renee-stewart.html

[J. T. SHEA]

You don't have a lawyer, Nathan!? Lucky man! I thought Americans were all assigned lawyers at birth, just in case.

[siebendach]

There was a time when a lot of Americans had a lawyer they called "their lawyer" --- a generalist who handled all the ordinary stuff that comes up in an ordinary person's life: looked over their business contracts, did their wills, handled all their real estate purchases, registered their company name if they started a business.

That lawyer has gone the way of the private-practice, solo GP physician. They still exist here and there, but only the lucky and the well-financed stay in business that way for very long.

Today's lawyers have to have a niche, and stick to it. . . both for the sake of achieving maximum efficiency, and for being able to market themselves in a way that makes them stand out. Or, they don't make it.