Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse of Central Texas

Texas Lawyer Blog
September 17, 2009

Just as politics can sometimes make strange bedfellows, apparently so can barratry. When the Bay Area Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse held a press conference on Sept. 16 in Corpus Christi to announce a Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse advertising campaign aimed against barratry, Corpus Christi plaintiffs lawyer William R. Edwards participated in the briefing. Edwards, a partner in The Edwards Law Firm, says he does not support all of BACALA’s agenda, but he is with them on the subject of barratry. “We are all interested in the very same thing and that is a judicial system that is fair, honest and open to everyone. . . . Barratry is skewing the system and it’s causing it to not work properly,” Edwards says of the effect of the practice also known as case-running or ambulance-chasing. BACALA chairman Chip Hough says the anti-barratry television ad will run on stations in the Corpus Christi and central Texas markets for up to six weeks. The ad, titled “Put the Brakes on Ambulance-Chasing,” features a lawyer who waits by a large crack in a sidewalk for prospective clients, and asks viewers concerned about “lawsuit abuse” to join Texans Against Lawsuit Abuse in Austin. Hough says he hopes the Texas Legislature will pass a bill during the 2011 session to “put more teeth in the legislation we have against barratry right now.” Edwards says he would like the Legislature to create a private cause of action for victims of barratry to allow them to collect damages for mental anguish. He says, “That would allow people illegally contacted in funeral homes and ICUs and emergency rooms to bring claims against the lawyers and other people involved.” In Texas, barratry is a misdemeanor, and in some cases, a third-degree felony.
-- Brenda Sapino Jeffreys