News

• May 2008 Michael Maggiano, Christopher DiGirolamo and Michael Lizzi have been voted in by their fellow lawyers as among the Top Lawyers in New Jersey according to a 2008 poll published in New Jersey Monthly Magazine. Read the article (PDF) >
• May 2008 MD&L opens its new satellite office in New York City at the Grinnell Building, 800 Riverside Drive, in the historic Audubon section of the city.  This office will serve the firm's existing and future New York clients.  Michael Lizzi will manage the new office.
• May 2008 Protecting the Right to Trial by Jury
  
  

  Journal #1
  Law Day, May 1, 2008

  About two hundred years ago, in a book entitled, The Education of Children, Michelle de Montayne wrote, Our deeds are the true mirror of our doctrine.

  We trial lawyers are not often celebrated for our deeds. We have been caused to endure the label of hired gun or ambulance chasers by the opponents to trial by jury and the contingent fee.

  In the 1950s we were subject to attack from none other than the widely read Reader's Digest, which published an outrageous article entitled, The Personal Injury Racket. A few years later Harpers Magazine published an article entitled Damages Suits: A path to Immortality. Such articles were followed by the funny and popular movie with Jack Lemon and Walter Matthau, entitled, The Fortune Cookie.

  Then, of course, came the headlines in the newspapers of the 60s and 70s on the impending insurance crisis. We witnessed the onslaught of adds in the mid 70s that amounted to jury tampering and finally the massive Tort Deform movement of the 1980's and 90's. In the October 1989 issue of Forbes Magazine, we witnessed a blazing front cover headline entitled, The Litigation Scandal, How Trial Lawyers Get Rich Exploiting the Justice System.

  With the new millennium came an even greater attack on the Tort System and trial lawyers. Sadly a misguided media helped certain elements in our society who have a self interest in stopping claims by the injured and published wildly exaggerated tales of Americans' overarching sense of legal entitlement.

  Over time these legal myths were all proven to be untrue and can be found on the internet in various legal myths and legends websites. USA Today in 2005 reported in a story by reporter Jonathan Turly: Have you heard about the guy who injured himself while using his lawn mower as a hedge clipper, and then won $500,000 in a lawsuit against the lawn mower company? How about the woman who threw a soft drink at her boyfriend, slipped on the wet floor, and then won $100,000 in a lawsuit against the restaurant? These are only two of the common examples of lawsuit abuses that are fueling the call for "litigation reform." They are also completely untrue part of a growing collection of legal mythologies that are appearing widely in the national media.

  U.S. News & World Report owner Mort Zuckerman used the story of the soft drink lady in Pennsylvania in an article denouncing lawsuit abuse. He is not alone. The tale of Amber Carlson and her soda has appeared in countless television and print sources. Zuckerman also cited the case of a woman who knocked her teeth out while sneaking through a nightclub's restroom window to avoid paying a $3.50 cover charge and then won $12,000 from a jury. It is also false.

  These are the legal versions of the urban legends about alligators living in the New York City sewers having been flushed down toilets by kids who brought them back from Florida. Legal legends fit the stereotype of litigation so well that their falsity becomes secondary.

  The problem has always been that we have been misunderstood by our deeds. How many times have we heard, and, yes even joked amongst ourselves that Nobody likes a lawyer until he needs one. The best we can respond to the detractors of our judicial system and legal profession is by our deeds.

  Today we have a great opportunity through the internet to reach out to every one with solid information about the Truth about the Greatest Engine for Justice on earth: Trial by Jury in America. In recent years, the public has been intoxicated by a multimedia propaganda campaign which has as its goal, the doing away with trial by jury, the destruction of the Seventh Amendment of our Constitution. It is in part the mission of this website to teach the public the great good that flows from our civil justice process. It is our professional duty and responsibility as officers of the Court to protect our system and see to it that the courthouse doors remain fully opened so that the basic premise of the common law, that for wrong there is a remedy, does not become mere hollow words read in a history book.

  It has been my experience that Americans are fascinated by the legal process and thirst for information about it. It is our goal that our visitors learn of the precious rights protected by our judicial system and the need to sustain the principles of justice and fairness it embodies.

  It is our hope to inform our visitors, friends and neighbors about our system of justice, and a little bit about ourselves. Through this website we hope to demonstrate that the American Judicial System founded over 200 years ago on the rights of the individual citizen, is one of the best designed mechanisms for the administration of justice in the world today. It is our goal to remove the mystique and confusion about what we do as Trial Lawyers. Indeed, the ultimate fate of our justice system depends on the people's knowledge and appreciation of its merit and worth. When they lose faith in a system, its fabric will unravel to a point beyond recognition.

  I look forward to sharing with you my thoughts and experiences culled from the past 34 years of trying cases in the courtrooms of New York and New Jersey and my experiences in working through Legislative action to protect the rights of citizens and fight to make sure even the most humble amongst us has his and her keys to the Courthouse through the contingent fee process and trial by jury.

  All the best,
  Michael Maggiano

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