That is what my friends new lawyer said to her after reviewing the case file which took 2 weeks to get from her old lawyer she fired because of incompetence. If you live in North Carolina there aint much you can do about it. Lawyers in this state have a pretty good thing going on. I recently helped my friend file a bar complaint and got a glimpse into the legal world of NC and it was very revealing .To start off if you take a lawyer to court for malpractice it is very hard. You have to prove “a case with in a case” not only do you have to prove the lawyer made a mistake but that the mistake caused you actual monetary damage. Not as easy as it sounds because you would have to prove if your case was handled right you would have prevailed and what money amounts you would have made. So because of this not to many malpractice cases are ever brought to trial unless they are easy to win. The main route for dealing with a incompetent lawyer is to take him/her to the “Bar” .Lawyers in this state are self regulating so no state license .They get their license from the Bar and they are self policing, so if you have a grievance you write to the bar and they will look into it and impose discipline if warranted. The Bar looks into well over a thousand of these grievances a year and imposes punishment on a small fraction of them,pretty much your buddy you went to law school with is now deciding your fate lol. The grievance you file gets shown to the lawyer you are complaining about but you don’t get to see the lawyers reply its all done by committee behind closed doors if you call and ask the status they are very curt with you and simply say its being looked in to .They will give you no info and like with my friend after 9 months of” looking into it” she got a short letter saying that the allegations against the lawyer couldn't be proved so the grievance is dropped with no explanation no nothing I think its time to bring lawyers,who perform a very valuable function in society like doctors , under state control .There needs to be a better set of checks and balances on the legal system and simply not the honor system. Lawyers should have to apply for a license just like a doctor or nurse from the state with oversight. I am curious what you all think.
