How to Find the Best Personal Injury Attorney in Fresno
If you’ve been injured in an accident, the surest way to protect your vital legal rights and interests is to retain the services of a skilled, experienced, tenacious Fresno personal injury attorney. There are some important tactics to employ to find the best personal injury lawyer in Fresno for your case.
Obtain Recommendations from People in Your Life
When seeking the best personal injury lawyer in Fresno an ideal starting point is to discuss your situation and need for capable legal representation with family members, friends, colleagues, and other associated. In this day and age, it is highly likely that you have people in your life that you have confidence in and trust who have been the victims of a personal injury caused by the negligence of someone else.
Odds many of these individuals retained a personal injury attorney. People in your life who have utilized the professional services of an accident lawyer will have two primary types of information to provide to you, depending on their experiences. Some will be able to provide you with names of legal counsel that they found capable and effective. On the other hand, you may find some people you are associated with who will be able to steer you away from certain attorneys which may not prove to be the best for you in your case.
Consult Martindale-Hubbell
When considering Freson personal injury lawyers for your case, another way you can identify a suitable lawyer is to consult the Martindale-Hubbell directory. People in the legal community are familiar with this directory. People among the public at large understandably may not be familiar with the resource.
Martindale-Hubbell regularly produces a directory that list and rates attorneys across the United States in an array of different practice areas, including those who practice personal injury law. Martindale-Hubbell has a no-cost attorney search feature online using the resources contained in its latest directory.
Unlike many other rating and review sources online and in the brick and mortar world, the rating used by Martindale-Hubbell is derived from peer and other professional evaluations. In other words, the ratings from Martindale-Hubbell is not at all like an online score and rating posted on an internet platform by an individual who may have some sort of grudge or who may not otherwise be particularly objective.
Use State Bar of California Resources
The State Bar of California provides the general public with a searchable directory of attorneys who practice in different areas of the law. If you are seeking a personal injury attorney in Fresno, the State Bar attorney directory definitely is a resource you will want to take advantage of when seeking legal representation.
One of the benefits of taking advantage of the State Bar of California resource is found in the fact that it is user friendly. You can readily find personal injury attorneys that practice in and around Fresno.
Use Fresno County Bar Association Resources
When seeking a personal injury attorney in Fresno, the Fresno County Bar Association maintains a searchable database of lawyers and law firms practicing in the county. The directory classifies legal counsel in a number of different ways including by geographic location and area of practice.
The Fresno County Car Association searchable attorney data base is available to the general public at no charge. The database is regularly updated to ensure that information about legal counsel practicing in Fresno County is correct and timely.
Take Full Advantage of Initial Consultation with a Fresno Personal Injury Attorney
The typical Fresno personal injury lawyer will schedule what is known as an initial consultation with a prospective client like you. An initial consultation is designed to give Fresno personal injury lawyers a chance to evaluate a case for a client’s benefit and to give legal counsel the chance to see if he or she wants to take the case. An initial consultation also provides a person in your shoes seeking representation the chance to learn more about a lawyer and to examine his or her legal background and practice. An initial consultation provides you with a valuable resource when it comes to finding the best personal injury attorney in Fresno.
The steps you need to take to use an initial consultation to full advantage include:
- Prepare a general list of questions (about 10 to 12) for an attorney that address issues important to you. By creating a list in advance, you lessen the risk that you will forget to raise an issue during the course of your first appointment.
- Among the questions on your list should be queries about educational background and experience. When it comes to experience, you do want to pursue that point beyond the general. In other words, if an attorney advises he or she has been a Fresno personal injury attorney for 20 years, you need to find out more about how often counsel has handled a case similar to your own.
- Get an overview of how a particular Fresno personal injury law firm works. For example, find out who your primary point of contact will be at a law practice. Will it be the attorney? Or will it be a legal assistant or someone else?
- As will be discussed more in a moment, an initial consultation is an ideal time to obtain references from a potential attorney.
Some people seeking legal assistance schedule an initial consultation with a few attorneys when seeking the best personal injury attorney in Fresno. That is an acceptable strategy but you don’t want to go overboard and schedule initial appointments with too many Fresno personal injury lawyers. Two or three appointments of this nature should suffice when seeking the best personal injury lawyer in Fresno.
Keeping the number of initial appointments with personal injury lawyers in Fresno down to a manageable number dictates that you be thorough in using the other strategies set forth here for you. By fully using the other strategies enumerated here initially, you will be in a position to narrow down the total number of prospective Fresno personal injury lawyers you need to meet with as part of your due diligence.
Obtain References from Potential Fresno Personal Injury Attorneys
Ideally, obtain the names of at least three references from an attorney you are considering hiring. Don’t “go crazy” when seeking references from a lawyer. You certainly can request more than three, but in all honesty, topping the list of references at five will be more than enough. References can include not only former clients but colleagues of an attorney as well.
Make certain you reach out to references provided by a Fresno personal injury lawyer. Oftentimes, people meet with Fresno personal injury lawyers, obtain the names of references, but do not contact these people.
Speaking of initial consultations with Fresno personal injury attorneys, this really is the step in the process that ultimate results in there being a personal injury lawyer in Fresno on your case. What this means is that you should be as proactive as possible in identifying a personal injury attorney in Fresno (or more than one Fresno personal injury lawyers) to schedule a preliminary appointment. In nearly all personal injury cases, an injured person is best served by engaging legal representation sooner rather than later.
