If you’re watching this video or listening to the audio version, that means a lawsuit alleging various employment law claims was recently filed against your company according to public court records.
You may be asking yourself, “I don’t even know about this lawsuit or I haven’t been served yet.” Well, you’re not alone since this information is likely to reach you before the process server.
Hi, I’m Attorney Elliot Stone, managing partner of Stone LLP, California’s leading civil defense law firm serving the business community. My firm represents companies just like yours in defending employment lawsuits just like this.
Before I tell you why my firm is the smart choice to defend this lawsuit, we need to address California’s lawsuit crisis. As you probably already know, California’s lawsuit crisis, California’s businesses are getting sued at an alarming rate, and it’s reached epidemic proportions. So if you’re like most business owners, you’re probably mad and outraged that you and your business have been sued, and I don’t blame you.
Lawsuits are expensive, they’re time-consuming, and they put the future of your business at risk. If you’ve been sued before, you know exactly what I mean, and this video will likely forever alter your approach to defending lawsuits. As you know, the law imposes very strict response deadlines, mandating a written response be filed with the court within the time period set by law to avoid a default judgment against you and putting your personal and business assets at risk.
But what you may not know is most lawyers are scared to go to trial. That most lawyers out there, even those who claim to be litigators and trial attorneys, are scared and afraid of going to trial. And even worse, they lack the critical skills in the courtroom to competently defend your case.
In fact, did you know the average trial attorney only conducts one trial or arbitration every two to three years?
Well, not me.
In the past two years, I’ve personally conducted four trials and arbitrations. That’s an average of one trial or arbitration every six months. My most recent was a seven-week federal court trial. And unlike most litigators, I really do enjoy going to trial.
Why does this matter, you ask?
Well, when you hire an attorney to defend this case, the first thing the other side’s lawyer will do is look up your new attorney to find out how many trials or arbitrations your new lawyer has conducted. And if your new lawyer has never taken a case to trial or has not done so recently, the opposing attorney will zero in on this weakness and certainly hold out for a higher settlement number, knowing your new lawyer just doesn’t have what it takes to go to trial.
I call these types of attorneys settlement lawyers, as opposed to legitimate trial lawyers. And in the end, hiring a settlement lawyer will cost you substantially more money to resolve this case because everyone, especially the other side’s attorney, knows settlement lawyers never go to trial. You know, I’ve been seeing settlement values on these cases just skyrocket over the last few years, making your choice of attorney critically important in assuring a successful and cost-effective case resolution.
Since we know how to get the upper hand, most lawyers hate going to trial. The best way to get the upper hand in this case is to appear to the other side as though you’re ready, you’re willing, and eager to take the case to trial, even if you’re not.
So how do you do that? You do that by sending a message to the other side that you’re ready, willing, and eager to take this to trial, and using an attorney like me that has the trial skills and experience to take the case to trial. In my opinion, this is one of the single greatest factors in motivating a plaintiff into settling.