Philadelphia authorities have indicted Center City lawyer D. Allen Litt and 14 others over what they say was a quarter-century-old scheme of bogus personal injury claims employing 100 runners and working with about ten physicians. Slip-falls were a favorite: “He would send his runners to look for cracks in sidewalks in front of businesses large and small, supermarkets, large drugstore chains, mom-and-pop stores, any commercial business whatsoever,” said Philadelphia D.A. Lynne Abraham. “The imposters would obtain medical care from physicians selected by Litt and rack up inflated medical bills via numerous visits to the Litt-selected doctors, the grand jury charged,” per the Legal Intelligencer. Some claimants had genuine injuries incurred elsewhere which they brought to the scene of the intended staging. “Abraham said Litt would pay people fees ranging from a couple of hundred to a thousand dollars to find the sites and stage the fake accidents. The lawsuits would yield thousands of dollars for Litt, officials said.” (Vernon Clark, “Lawyer charged with running 25-year fraud”, Philadelphia Inquirer, Dec. 12; Amaris Elliott-Engel, “Pa. Attorney Charged in Insurance Fraud Case”, The Legal Intelligencer, Dec. 13).
“Hundreds upon hundreds and hundreds of fake accidents”
Philadelphia authorities have indicted Center City lawyer D. Allen Litt and 14 others over what they say was a quarter-century-old scheme of bogus personal injury claims employing 100 runners and working with about ten physicians. Slip-falls were a favorite: “He would send his runners to look for cracks in sidewalks in front of businesses large […]
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The punishment for this repeated should be life imprisonment. Why? Because the bottom line is that when you employ the court system to coerce money from people, then you are arming yourself with the power of the state. And that is as coercive as it gets. That makes it every bit as egregious as an armed robbery or other crime of violence. Actually, in some ways it is far far worse. You can physically resist an armed robber, you cannot resist a court order.
Wow … it only took the “legitimate” lawyers charged with protecting the public 25 years to do something about their crooked bar brothers.
Good work Lynne, better late then never.
Walk around City Hall, where Lynne Abraham works. One in four people wears a neck brace.
It’s not called a Philadelphia collar for nothing.
http://www.abledata.com/product_images/images/02A0349.jpg
I’m sure that if the district attorneys of the five boroughs looked into it, they’d find the same malfeasance in New York City, where I defended trip-fall cases. There were so many cases there that were obviously fraudulent, but it doesn’t take much to push that through with a jury. The whole thing is revolting – a crooked money game that makes a mockery of the rule of law.
But as the editor of this site noted in one article about it, the very people in a position to reform – New York’s state legislators – are the very people profiting from this crooked game: plaintiff’s lawyers. So they’ve got very little incentive to do anything about it, which is itself another breach of the public trust.
Slip/fall–reminds me of my one and only time sitting on a jury. It was a year or so ago. I was an insurance executive in NYC so I don’t make it past voir dire but, go figure, on this case I was selected.
First day, the plaintiff crept into court using a walker and wearing the biggest neck collar I’ve ever seen. The plaintiff’s first witness was her chiropractor – who testified he had treated her for severe neck and back injuries for more than three years.
On cross-examination the defendant’s attorney asked the chiropractor if he had been paid for treating the plaintiff. He started to answer when the plaintiff’s attorney shouted “objection” – the Judge immediately ruled “sustained” and instructed us jurors to disregard the question. The defense attorney showed not the least bit of surprise.
Well, I was sure surprised. Why was this question disallowed? I still think the question is directly relevant to the chiropractor’s professional impartiality and therefore his credibility as a witness.
(Immediately thereafter the Judge called both attorneys to the bench and asked the jury to leave. We were advised after another 10 minutes that the plaintiff had settled. I tried to catch up with the defending attorney to ask why her question was disallowed, but she, like Elvis, had left the building.)
So why did the Judge disallow that question?
Anyone? Anyone?