I am reminded by the recent case of the ESPN newscaster, Erin Andrews, who was filmed by a stalker naked in the privacy of a room at a hotel for which she paid. The stalker asked the hotel staff to give him the room next to Ms. Andrews. Without inquiring and checking this weird request and the stalker’s himself out, the hotel gave him the room. He then proceeded to do what stalkers do: He created a peep hole to videotape the sportscaster naked as she got ready for work. The stalker then posted the crude video on the internet horribly embarrassing and traumatizing the sports caster. The hotel chain that employed these people who allowed this stalker to have the room next to hers are liable. Period. No question.
The shock many folks have is how the sportscaster is being treated in this case, essentially a sex crimes case. No woman should be stripped of her clothing and put on public display. Yet this is what happened because of the staff’s slack attention to a weird request. No woman would do this unintentionally.
Amazingly, the defense lawyers (for the insurance company for the hotel), like in many rape trials, has taken the position the sportscaster is somehow responsible for this horrific invasion of her most intimate moments, wanted to be publicly paraded in the nude and has “made more money” since this incident and she did it to “make money.”
Rubbish.
Here’s an article highlighting this shameful tactic of the insurance defense lawyers. http://www.vox.com/2016/3/3/11153974/erin-andrews-trial
To give you an idea of how crass and crude such insurance company tactics are, one of the witnesses for the defense was at lunch watching the video with his lunch companions and making fun of the sportscasters nude body.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/erin-andrews-trial-delayed-witness-accused-watching-nude-video-n530656
The insurance defense lawyers for Their defense team should be excoriated for this tactic. The only question here is “how much money should it be required to pay her for this most heinous violation of a person’s right to alone in the privacy of a room they paid for and expect to have privacy in.
In the trials I have, it’s no different. Insurance adjusters and insurance defense lawyers blame my injured clients. They act like and accuse my clients of not doing anything to avoid their injury or of “faking” their injuries. They say my injured clients “over treated with their doctors” or “didn’t tell the doctors the truth about their history” or are “doing in for the money” or a host of other things to make them feel bad that they have been injured.
Rubbish.
When you’ve been injured, it’s not your fault. Period. None of my clients want to be hurt. Every one of them would give all the money to which they are entitled to back if they could be “they way [they] were. Being in the wrong place when someone decides to act unreasonably is not your “fault.” It’s not or shameful to be a victim. It’s the same with a rape victim, or a privacy violation like Erin Burnett, or an elderly victim of a reverse mortgage or financial swindle. Was Stephen Spielberg or Barbara Streisand supposed to be shamed or embarrassed because Bernie Madoff swindled millions from them? No.
These twisted lies of insurance adjusters and the insurance defense lawyers they send out to win, regardless the truth, who employ “blame the victim” tactics or say “they asked for it” or “they should have been doing something else” have no place in a court of law. No judge should put up with that.
It’s the same with a personally injured person. You should not be “ashamed,” embarrassed,” “humiliated” because you were injured by your incident. This is an injury on top of the physical and mental injury already suffered. Don’t feel or be blamed for your injury.
I fight these ridiculous accusations against my clients. My clients are not going to be blamed for something that is not their fault and which they would gladly give back any money. Like Erin Andrews, my clients didn’t ask for their injuries. My clients are not going to be accused of doing something no reasonable person would do solely “for money.”
You should not put up with that. When I take your case, I won’t let that happen to you. If I represent you, you are not getting blamed.
Period.