Previously in this series: How to confront the post-crash litigation threat -- start at the scene of the accident
Vallie Dugas is Associate General Counsel for Melton Truck Lines. She comes from a trucking family, of a fashion. Her father owned truck dealerships when she was growing up. Her diesel mechanics’ knowledge from time growing up around the shop is “absolutely useless knowledge” these days, she said. “I almost never have a mechanical failure case” in her current role defending her company.
After law school, and a brief time defending maritime-related cases in federal jurisdictions, she answered an ad for a position with $28K starting pay. “It was a plaintiffs’ firm,” she said, among the biggest advertising firms out there. She hadn’t known that when she answered the ad, but ultimately wound up accepting the job and serving there for 12 years.
Dugas presented a kind of anatomy of the plaintiffs’ attorney shop as part of the Truckload Carriers Association’s Safety & Security Division annual meeting this past June in St. Louis, with a mind to give carriers of all shapes and sizes tips on getting ahead of the threat of litigation from such firms.
How do plaintiffs’ attorneys get cases? Well, you’ve seen the billboards, the Youtube videos, the city buses decked with custom-wrap ads bumper to bumper – that much is obvious.
[Related: Dodging the ambulance chasers]
