Last year, New York lawmakers considered common sense reforms that would insert fairness into the civil justice system by lowering awards in civil lawsuits. But trial lawyers took issue with this legislation – and the impact it would have on their paydays – and came out in full force against the bill.

We all know that legal reforms are important to a thriving economy. But year after year, some states fail to pass common sense reforms.  Why? Well, one answer is the political power of the trial bar.

Each year, wealthy personal injury lawyers donate millions of dollars to national and local candidates. Their goal? Elect their friends to office and further their lawsuit creation-agenda.

The trial bar is, without a doubt, one of the nation’s most powerful political players. Wealthy personal injury lawyers donate millions of dollars to political candidates with a single goal – elect their friends to office so they can further their lawsuit-creation agenda. 

If you’re a longtime reader of our blog, you’ll know all about West Virginia’s former attorney general, Darrell McGraw. By all accounts, McGraw’s ethics during his twenty-year tenure as West Virginia AG were questionable, to say the least. For instance, he had a record of handing out state contracts to his personal injury lawyer campaign donors and spending state settlement funds on promotional  and self-serving trinkets. 

Tort reformers have been turning up all over the internet recently. We took the liberty of rounding up some of the standouts. You may recognize a few friends of Project Lawsuit Abuse in there. Here are some of the newsmakers from around the country.

If you’re a regular reader of our blog, you know that California has one of the country’s worst legal climates. That’s why we were hardly surprised when we heard yet another ridiculous settlement from the state.

Listen to this: in 2011, after more than two years of litigation, a man won a sexual harassment case for $550, or less than percent of damages requested. While he didn’t walk away empty-handed, he clearly didn’t win the lawsuit lottery.

In 2005, Congress passed the groundbreaking Class Action Fairness Act, which cracked down on out-of-control lawsuits in which lawyers got millions and plaintiffs got coupons. While we still see plenty of ridiculous some class action settlements (remember the one where plaintiffs got $5 drink vouchers and attorneys qualified for up to $7 million?), this legislation was a great step toward improving our civil justice system.

The bad news is that Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood has potentially been exploiting a loophole the Class Action Fairness Act.

As if we haven’t heard enough about personal injury lawyers behaving badly, another one has been caught stealing from his client. And this time, it was an elderly client!

Prosecutors say Kerry D. Brown entered a guilty plea Monday to theft of the assets of an aged person, monetary instrument abuse and forgery. Brown represented an elderly client in an automobile accident and stole more than $58,000 in settlement funds. Can you believe that? 

Another day, another personal injury lawyer in trouble. Latest on our list is Thomas Corea from Texas. Maybe you’ve heard of him? He used to host a biweekly call-in TV show, called “Ask the Lawyer with Tom Corea.”

We hope you never called him for legal advice, though – turns out he wasn’t very good! He was recently convicted of stealing from several of his clients, with a counsel for the state bar calling it the “most extreme case of lawyer misconduct” that she had ever seen.   

Despite the efforts of reform-minded legislators, Louisiana still has a lot of work to do in improving its legal climate. For instance, the state continues to suffer from out of control “legacy lawsuits.” More recently, a massive lawsuit brought by a southeast Louisiana flood control board offers an upsetting example of trial lawyer greed.  

All too often, personal injury lawyers abuse our courts for a profit, filing abusive and wasteful lawsuits at the expense of consumers. Sometimes, they even commit outright fraud, violating laws in order to get rich.

That’s exactly what personal injury lawyers Robert Peirce and Louis Raimond did when they conspired with a radiologist to fabricate asbestos claims, having him fake diagnoses so they could clog up West Virginia’s courts with meritless lawsuits.    

Last week, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon, egged on by politically influential personal injury lawyers who have donated to his campaign, vetoed a number of important legal reform bills passed by the state legislature. But thankfully, lawmakers pulled together enough votes to override his vetoes and pass the reforms.