Legal Question in Personal Injury in Illinois

Re: Attorney Lien

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Re: Attorney Lien

An attorney's lien protects the attorney, not you! It tells the insurance company that the attorney is entitled to a fee, so that they don't pay you without him knowing.

Depending on where you are, the liability and your injuries, it may well take a lawsuit being filed before your case is resolved. It is my practice to prepare every case as if it were going to trial. Insurance companies tend to respond better to a lawyer who is prepared to try a case to a jury than one who is only interested in settling a claim.

Re: Attorney Lien

Dear David,

I see at the website that another lawyer has answered your question, and his advice is sound. Please permit me to make a few more comments:

You first ask �what will my attorney have to do to settle this claim?� There are too few facts in your inquiry upon which I could render an opinion, particularly one where I would be substituting my judgment for an attorney possessed of ALL the facts (i.e., your lawyer).

With regard to your question about attorney�s liens, Illinois law provides:

�Attorneys at law shall have a lien upon all claims, demands and causes of action, including all claims for unliquidated damages, which may be placed in their hands by their clients for suit or collection, or upon which suit or action has been instituted, for the amount of any fee which may have been agreed upon by and between such attorneys and their clients, or, in the absence of such agreement, for a reasonable fee, for the services of such suits, claims, demands or causes of action, plus costs and expenses. . . . Such lien shall attach to any verdict, judgment or order entered and to any money or property which may be recovered, on account of such suits, claims, demands or causes of action, from and after the time of service of the notice.�

An attorneys lien creates a legal situation (and procedure for enforcement) whereby an attorney working for a client can safeguard and enforce his right to a fee based upon the proceeds obtained as a result of the litigation or settlement. In the absence of such a lien, the insurance company in your case could disregard your lawyer�s efforts and go straight to you to settle the claim. An attorney has two remedies to protect his fee for services to his client: first, if there has been a sum recovered by suit or paid by settlement, or property has been received by his client, he may pursue his lien by perfecting the lien through proceedings against the fund or property; or secondly, he may as assignee sue the debtor (in your case, the insurance company) of his client for his interest in the asserted claim. With the lien in place, the insurance company knows that, even after the claim is settled, your lawyer could pursue the company for his fee.

It is very common for attorneys involved in claims and litigation to serve the other party with the notice of attorney�s lien. It eliminates an area of potential skullduggery thereby permitting all parties involved to concentrate on the merits of the claim and its settlement. In other respects, the lien does not serve you, it serves your lawyer.

Re: Attorney Lien

I will add my 2 cents worth: It sounds like you have are frustrated with respect to the time it has taken to resolve your case. Be mindful that insurance companies will do anything in their power to short change the victim and in effect to victimize you once again by delaying and doing anything they can not to settle a case. An insurance company has everything to gain by playing all sorts of games resulting in delay and everything to lose in attempting to come up with a fair and reasonable compensation for the

negligence of their insured. In another words, the insurance company is not your friend.

You attorney in all likelihood has done all that can be done to settle a claim. It is always more profitable to dispose of a claim through settlement than taking the matter all the way to trial. If, negotiations have failed and the insurance company won't even return a phone call, it is time to file the lawsuit and take the matter to court and have 12 stranger in a jury decide the case. Statute of limitation for filing a personal injury claim is 2 years from the date of the occurrence.

On another note: You need to understand your rights with respect to your lawyer: he must give you a status of what it is that he has done in order to bring the matter to a close and he must show you his efforts and the result.

Forget about the lien--it is not there for your protection, it is there for the lawyer's protection and so its existence won' t make any difference in your case.

I hope this helps,

Nima Taradji

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