trust, from your friends or from a health professional.
Among other sources are the referral services and the membership organizations. You can also go through the yellow pages and the information provided on-line.
Referral Services and State Bar Organizations
The state bar organizations are there to offer referral services in order to help people find attorneys who can deal with their respective cases. The disadvantage of this service is that any member of the organization is entitled to list with its referral service and thus, you can never be sure just from the referral that the lawyer refereed to you is truly a qualified one!
Besides, there are many other specialty organizations that online directories which can help you find a lawyer qualified to deal with your case. The ‘Association of Trial Lawyers of America’ (ATLA) is one such organization. The advantage is that a number of lawyers having significant experience in the field of personal injury laws are members of ATLA.
However, before hiring any lawyer who is a member of such legal organizations, it is advisable to gather genuine information about him or her. This is because membership fee is all it takes to become a member of such organizations.
Internet Lawyer Directories
You will find a number of commercial on-line directories that claim to screen and list only highly qualified attorneys. However, do not get carried away by the attractive offers and promises made in these directories. This is because most of these are not genuine.
These on-line directories are highly commercialized and so, have a tendency to list any personal injury lawyer who manages to pay the required fee!
You will also come across a number of websites on the Internet that claims to be informational but actually are either not genuine or are owned by the law firms. Therefore, be wary of “injury information” websites that do not make obvious the identity of its sponsor.
