BLOG HOME

The Truth About Who Files Lawsuits

The Truth About Who Files Lawsuits

Posted by: Kevin Costello

As an attorney representing the rights of individuals rather than those of corporations, I can tell you that the “Journey to Justice” is slanted against the right of the individual; that it is seeded with landmines placed by corporate, banking, insurance, and vested interests who regard lawyers as an impediment to their abuse of normal citizens.

In your heart, do you really believe that the majority of the lawsuits filed in our Courts are filed by “frivolous” plaintiffs seeking to get something for nothing?  Really?  Or is that just something that it’s politically “hip” to say, or to agree with, when someone else says it? 

In your heart, you know, don’t you, that that is not true?  Don’t you ever find it suspicious that the only real conversation that seems to happen about this comes from the people with the most money to spend?  Don’t you find it suspicious that the various “chambers of commerce” across the country, and the Federal “chamber of commerce”, are not really chambers discussing commerce, but really PR machines, designed to spend billions of dollars on anti-lawyer, anti-plaintiff and pro-corporate ads?

Please don’t be gullible.

Corporate disputes – that is to say, suits between businesses – dominate dockets throughout the fifty states.  The majority of lawsuits filed in this country are filed by corporations and businesses against other corporations and businesses to protect their money, to advance their interests, to protect their patents and trademarks, to claim breaches of contract, fraud, defamation and other forms of relief, and, most importantly, to seek damages.  How ironic it is that these very same interests are willing to take away your right, to claim damages, but to preserve their own?

Have you ever heard about “corporate tort reform”?  Of course not.  Why in the world would the corporations with the power to change the playing field want to tilt it against themselves?  They're not fools.

They just assume you are. 

The United States Supreme Court begins its October 5, 2009 term with a business heavy case load.  More than half of the forty-five cases set for the new term focus on business interests and business rights.  There are no plaintiff’s employment cases and no plaintiff’s environmental disputes which have been granted review. 

On the other hand, there are plenty of cases on patent infringement, anti-trust law and white-collar crime matters on the docket.

So ask yourself the following question.  As easy as it is to agree with the nonsense at the parties and barbeques and on TV, nonsense which has been spoon-fed to you by banking, insurance and corporate interests and their powerful PR machines masquerading as “neutral” statistics and news, do you really think, based upon the cases that are going before the Supreme Court, that it’s plaintiffs and their claims for damages which are a problem in our courts? 

Be honest.

In addition to being honest, be smart and be brave.  When people tell you that “lawyers” and “plaintiffs” and “claims for damages” are a “problem”, ask them for statistics.  Don’t let them get away with quoting you Rush Limbaugh’s statistics, or statistics from the Federal Chamber of Commerce.  Ask for neutral statistics.  Ask them how many plaintiffs cases for individuals are filed in this country, as opposed to cases filed by corporations against other corporations, and businesses against other businesses.  Ask them to tell you how many punitive damages verdicts there really are, versus the number the right tells you there are. 

The truth will surprise you.  The corporations in this country have long been gaining control over our lives; the Court and the politicians who appoint to it are the gem in their crown.  Control justice, and you control America. 

Ask yourself when you were a kid how many ads you saw for corporations that weren’t trying to sell a product in particular, they were just trying to sell their image?  That’s a recent phenomenon, and it’s really only been around for the last twenty five or thirty years.  Ask yourselves why they do that.  Why would they spend the money to simply remind you that they are there, and that they are wonderful people?

I’m not trying to sound like a conspiracy nut.  I’m simply telling you that corporations are selfish.  They are soulless.  They don’t care, because they are not designed to care.  They are designed to make money.  The people who run those corporations are relieved of individual responsibility for what they do in the name of the corporate quest for dollars.  Don’t trust a word that a corporation tells you, and certainly don’t trust what their paid “hacks” tell you.   Just look at the statistics.  The real statistics, like the caseload before the Supreme Court above.

Then ask yourselves where the real problem is.  Is it with lawyers, not spending billions on PR, but quietly going about trying to help people on an increasingly tilted playing field?  Or is it the unfettered and unholy access that corporations have to our legislators and now, to our courts through the appointment of judges by those legislators?

I don’t like it, and neither should you.

JOURNEY TO JUSTICE

DISCLAIMER: This web log is not legal advice, nor should it be construed to be legal advice or the offering of legal advice. It should not be read as guaranteeing or suggesting any particular outcome in any Court will occur in any particular case. It is not, and should be read as, a complete or authoritative analysis of the state of law, which is constantly subject to change.

"Journey to Justice" - The Web Log of Civil Rights Trial Lawyer Kevin M. Costello, Esq. (www.costellomains.com).