Legal Question in Legal Malpractice in Michigan

Legal Malpractice

I was attempting to start a Medical Malpractice as my wife died in June 2005. I obtained an attorney, we are in a rural area, He was to find a Malpractice attorney for me. I had a synopsis and all medical records which I gave to him. This was in June of 2006. I had not heard from Him so in Feb. 2006 I called his office a couple of times and left messages and he was supposed to contact me. When he finally did he stated that I would be contacted by a malpractice attorney in a couple of days, I asked him if this was the first attorney he had contacted and he stated yes. Now I get a negative response from the Malpractice attorney and the statute of Limitations runs out June 25th. Do I have any recourse against the inital attorney for taking up too much of my timeto be able to locate another attorney. Is there such a thing as Due Process in this type of case. Thank You


Asked on 5/20/07, 11:13 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
William Stern William Stern, P.C.

Re: Legal Malpractice

The only way that you would have a malpractice case against the lawyer for sitting on your file is if there was a case in the first place. Apparently, the lawyer that he referred the case to submitted it to an expert who came back with a negative opinion. Therefore, as long as the second lawyer submitted the case to a properly qualified expert, there would be no case against the first lawyer because there was no case in the first place. Of course, it is possible that the second lawyer did not submitt the case to a properly qualified expert. Therefore, if you contact me with the specifics about what happened with your wife and get me those records, I can take a look and see if it was properly submitted. If not, then it can be resubmitted to a properly qualified expert and if it turns out there was a malpractice case against the doctors, then you'd have a case against the first lawyer........maybe. Remember, the statute of limitations against a lawyer runs two years from the date the lawyer last serves you. That means any case that you start against the lawyer must be commenced within two years of that last service date. William S. Stern

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Answered on 5/23/07, 6:48 am


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