The Minefield of Timeshares …

The Minefield of Timeshares….. Timeshares can be a fun thing. However, when you’re done with them, timeshares can be a nightmare. The number one problem with timeshares is getting rid of them. Ah, the exotic locations are quite alluring at first. People pay usually more than $10,000 to get their foot in the door for an annual weekly stay at some great location. Even the yearly maintenance fee is usually not a chore for the first few years. Then, the kids grow up, or you Read More +

Gov. Rick Scott’s New Year’s Gift You Cannot Return

This is probably my most important blog post since I started writing one year ago. Please take a few moments to read this – it is, after all, about you if you drive a car in Florida. Much like the ugly sweater you received this Christmas that cannot be return without the receipt, our governor is giving you something you didn’t need or want, it’s a nasty piece-of-work and it’s coming your way on January 1, 2013. Like it or not – it’s going to Read More +

President Jimmy Carter: My Former Law Professor and the Value of Mediations

When I was a law student at Emory Law School in Atlanta, we had a very distinguished professor teach us about this newly developed process to settle serious disputes: Former President Jimmy Carter stood at the head of our classroom that semester in front of maybe 25 of us and spoke to us about Mediation. At the time, President Carter was out of office a number of years and his main accomplishment in the White House was peace in the Middle East through the Camp Read More +

The Happy, Thankful Lawyer

It is said there are no such things as happy lawyers, only happy people who made serious career mistakes. After all, the stereotyped attorney is a grumpy professional, surly, growling at the world through rapacious teeth just looking for a fight. In actuality, while there are some of those out there, they do tend to prematurely “self-deport” from the profession after massive strokes and heart attacks when they’ve won the legal fight but lost the war of living a meaningful life. And I have known Read More +

Low Speed Impacts Cannot Result in Injuries? Baloney!

For years car insurance companies have been hammering personal injury attorneys on cases where the car that was hit showed little-to-no property damage. The theory being, how can your client possibly be hurt when the car involved had a minimal amount of property damage? What’s “minimal” property damage? Believe it or not, most adjusters seem to think the $1,000 mark is the threshold. So, if it cost $900 to fix your car, there’s no way you can be injured. If it cost $1,010 to repair, Read More +

Dog Bites Man – Man Fights Back

We all love our pets, but we occasionally hear of something that went terribly wrong when a dog cannot control its behavior and a bite occurs resulting in an ugly injury. A few years ago a young mother from New Port Richey brought her beautiful 5 year old daughter to my office. With long blond hair and blue eyes, it was like she fell out of a Pottery Barn for Kids catalogue. But I immediately saw the problem. Besides an innate sadness not usually seen Read More +