Being in business may carry the inherent risk of being sued, but deep-pocket, high-profile and possibly unpopular clients such as governments and attorneys are often inviting targets for lawsuits.

Jim Gilpin is a partner in the Eminent Domain Practice Group of Best Best & Krieger and managing partner of the San Diego office. His firm represents a cross section of governments including the county of San Diego, numerous water districts and San Diego transit agencies.

“Exposure is very important, it’s a different dynamic than in business,” Gilpin says. “When you represent agencies, there is press coverage and the visibility of the claim.”

Gilpin says his task is to recommend the best course of action to the joint power agency or in-house counsel. “You don’t make the settle or go the court decision. We make a recommendation.”

An important consideration is whether the case sets a precedent. “If it’s a case that establishes a precedent, and if it goes to a jury that awards a big claim, 20 people may decide to hop on,” Gilpin explains.

Publicity and political considerations are also factors that may lead to settlement.

“It’s my job to advise the client on the pros and cons and it’s their decision to settle,” Gilpin says. “If they want to settle for something and I don’t agree with it, I don’t take it personally. In this day and age no one can tell you what 12 people in a box are going to do.”

If the case goes to the jury, the plaintiff may be cast as the little guy fighting the heartless bureaucracy. “Public entities are like big business,” Gilpin says. “There’s a tendency to be sympathetic to individuals.”

Robert Harrison, partner at Neil Dymott Brown Frank & Harrison, specializes in malpractice suits against doctors and lawyers.

Harrison says a doctor might be more likely than a lawyer to risk a trial to salvage a reputation. “If physicians settle, they’re obliged to make reports to the National Practitioner Data Bank; this has different significance in different jurisdictions. Florida has a three strikes measure; if a physician has three settlements, he’s not admitted to practice medicine anymore. Doctors concerned about their general reputation in the past may have been willing to settle, but now will resist. They’d rather take the chance of going to trial than report a settlement to the data base.”

Harrison represented a doctor who was the subject of criminal charges for performing unnecessary cataract procedures. “It was a 132- count indictment, and we wound up defending another 25 cases,” Harrison says. “They wouldn’t have been filed if he weren’t the subject of media attention, people thinking maybe my doctor did something to me.”

Sometimes the client’s personality enters the equation. “I represented an oral surgeon four times in trial; his problem is he’s not Marcus Welby,” Harrison explains. “He’s a skilled doctor but he has poor people skills. He just rubs people the wrong way, and doesn’t come across as sympathetic or understanding.”

Once his firm is hired, Harrison says the insurance carrier and the client may both have input into which lawyer is assigned the case, based on prior experience.

“When representing lawyers, the preference is to settle,” Harrison says. “There’s no national database reporting, and no stigma. Doctors enjoy a better image than attorneys,” Harrison says.

In one case, Harrison represented a lawyer “who was not a very tactful guy. He had an in-your-face demeanor … and had the misfortune of leaving a message on an answering machine filled with expletives. The judge allowed the recording to be played. Ultimately we succeeded, but it’s a challenge when a client fits a negative stereotype.”

Even lawyer jokes can play into the strategy. “Juries see the lawyer defendant and say he’s guilty; a lot of that frankly is the byproduct of the perverse humor about lawyers. Lawyer jokes tend to be more malicious than others. I don’t tell them anymore.”

It’s no joke that clients expect their attorneys to live up to their stereotype. “When we represent people, they want us to be aggressive and go for the jugular,” Harrison says. “That may not be your style but that’s what clients expect. They want that aggression.”

— Richard Acello