I'm Kezia. I'm a brain injury survivor and a member of bind.
I'm Kevin and I'm a, a stroke survivor and I'm also a member of Bind Fort Worth. On this episode, we welcome personal injury lawyer Scott Snellings with uh, Snelling's Law Firm, and he is also the Vice President of BIND, uh, on the board of directors here. Thanks for having me. So can you tell us a little bit about you and your practice?
Absolutely. Yeah. I, uh, I kind of fell into being a lawyer, um, no pun intended, even though I'm an injury lawyer. Uh, we have a personal injury law firm. Uh, all we do is help personal injury victims. That's our sole practice area. And, uh, we're based out of Frisco, Texas, and we also have a Sherman office as well. There's, there's 12 of us on the team. Um, all of the team members handle all of the cases, and so we really treat it as a collaborative process and a team driven process.
interesting. Yeah. So right now, We talked like two minutes ago about like your experience and all the things that you do, which is super awesome. But here at Bind, we are really interested in all the efforts that you put in towards brain injury survivors and how you do that. So a couple of people really had different types of questions and one of 'em was just, uh, what's the most important factors when you select a personal injury, survi, uh, injury. Attorney versus like what you do?
Like what is the difference between that?
Yeah, so personal injury attorneys handle basically any type of a case where someone is injured through no fault of their own. Okay? That can be what I call roadway accidents, which are car crashes, truck crashes, pedestrians, motorcyclists, bicyclists, all of those kinds of things. Uh, we also help people who are injured in premises liability cases. Say a balcony collapses or a handicap ramp isn't built correctly and someone falls and sustains an injury. We do those kinds of things.
Um, and then there's obviously medical malpractice. We don't handle that and many, many other areas such as products liability, there's, there's jam shop cases against bars who overserved people. Um, and then the, the different types of injuries can be classified differently too, such as wrongful death cases or catastrophic injury cases and things like. Yeah.
And I think, uh, one of the things that was also in my mind, like all brain injury survivors, like have had a different story, a personal story, but like as a, on your position, like as an attorney, how I, like how important is it really necessary for like, the level of expertise how much you've experienced and how, what do you, you know, like, like how do you know, like, you know, is that, that's your mean?
Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. So, you know, one of the things that I love about being a personal injury lawyer, I get to spend time with my clients and I get to learn about them. Right? Um, you know, insurance adjusters a lot of times, um, no offense to my fellow board member, Juan here, uh, but a lot of insurance adjusters kind of look at the claims as, as numbers on their desk or files on their desk. And one of the things that we really focus on is getting to know our clients.
Um, that way we know, you know, it's not just the medical bills that we're pursuing or the lost wages, but how has their life really been affected?.
Right.
There's no way to know that unless you really get to sit down and you get to hear their stories. And, uh, quite frankly, the, the catastrophically injured and the, the brain injury survivors that we get to help are some of the most inspiring people you will ever, ever meet. Um, the ones who. Really have that attitude of, yes, something bad happened to me, it, you know, I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Right? But that's part of my life I can't do anything about.
Now I can focus on doing everything I can to make the rest of my life as good and, uh, productive as possible. And for me, like that's just, that is so inspiring. Yeah. To, to be able to help people like that.
Yeah, I think so too.
So, um, someone comes to you and you go through the litigation and everything, and they're finally offered a settlement. How can someone evaluate whether that settlement is really fair or not?
Yeah, boy. Uh, we disagree about that every day of the week and twice on Sunday, uh, especially with adjusters. But, you know, one of the things that I love about our team is we have a weekly meet. We had it today. We called our attorney round table, and what we do is we talk about all the attorneys are sitting around and we talk about the cases. We talk about issues that we're having. How to get around certain problems. But the other thing we do is we talk about value.
Uh, you know, if, if I'm running a case, then I would present it to the rest of the attorneys at the table and I would say, you know, here's, here's the medical expenses, here's their injuries, and then here's, you know, the major parts of their life that had been affected. And, uh, you know, I might tell a. Right.
I might tell something in your, a day in the life for you that has, that really shows that aspect of your life that's so important to you that has either been taken away or hindered or, or you just don't enjoy doing things as much as you used to. Right. And then we, we kind of volley back and forth and we kind of come up with a range. Right. Okay. And everybody's gotta write it down beforehand, uh, you know, or. Be honest. Yeah. Um, so you're not influenced by someone else.
And our, our ranges can vary wildly. Mm-hmm. Right. It's funny though because, you know, my, my law partner Rocio has been doing this for quite a while and, and our pre lit attorney, Hannah, has been doing this for quite a while. Our values are, are pretty much, there's overlap in our ranges. Um, the younger guys are typically, if, if somebody's gonna be way off in, in left field on something, then it's gonna probably be one of them.
But that's great because we get to hear the reasoning behind it. Yeah. A lot of times the longer you do something, the more you can kind of tend to fall into patterns and you know, I can compare a case that, you know, you might come in, I'm like, okay, well this is very similar to a case that we had five years ago and I might kind of fall into that mindset a little bit.
And when you have the newer energy or the younger guys or, or ladies, Who don't have that experience, they may see something or value something a completely different way than me. And so I think once again, the collaboration process and coming to an evaluation of a case is huge. It's huge. If it's just Scott sitting there evaluating everything and putting numbers on it, I, I'm not gonna be as good as a group or a team doing the same thing. Right.
So would that influence. You and the attorney that you would pick if, if they did have these like powwows,
if I were injured, uh, and, and my wife had to go hire an attorney. I mean, obviously I have friends that, you know, she knows who I would want her to go to. Um, but if I had a friend who was out of town and was injured, you know, one of the things I would tell them is go interview a few attorneys and ask 'em about their process. Right. Uh, you could get this kind of 30,000 foot view process and this side or the other, kind of a canned answer.
Um, or you could get somebody who, for instance, if you were to come into us, I would tell you here's how our process works. You know, we're gonna take you through intake, we're gonna answer your questions. Um, we're gonna take a look at your treatment. We're gonna make sure that, um, you're seeing all the providers that you need to see. Right?
The last thing on earth we ever want is for someone to go through the process and they still have lingering injuries that we either don't know about or they haven't been treated or anything like that. And then, um, what we do is, you know, we're, we're communicating with them. Our firm, we, we reach out every two to three weeks to check in on you to see how your treatment's going, to see if you're getting better, uh, see what's up, what else is going on in your life.
And that's one of the ways that we get to know you that much better too. Um, a lot of times people, you know, will have issues arise after those initial appointments. You know, you may treat a knee because that's the most painful thing, and then as the knee starts to get better, then all of a sudden you realize that, hey man, my, my left shoulder is actually messed up too. We've had people walking around on broken bones before Oh, wow.
Because they had a, you know, an injury that was way more painful elsewhere in their body, and so they weren't really feeling the pain and the broken bone yet. Um, so, you know, we're, we're very thorough in that way. What we also tell 'em is while we have a process, that process is meant to make sure that we don't miss anything. Yes. But it's also individually tailored. Right. We, this is not an assembly line type of a practice, or at least I don't think a good one should be. Right.
It's, it's process driven and it's system driven to make sure that the ball doesn't get dropped, but it's very individualized and so unless it's a really big firm with a lot of people being able to touch the cases, You just can't provide enough attention. If it's a smaller firm and they have a ton of cases, you can't provide as much attention. Yeah. And so I would have, you know, whoever look and say, okay, well what number of cases is each either attorney or case manager handling?
And is that something that they can do effectively but also efficiently?
So do you think that if someone comes to you with a case, After the initial evaluation and they start having problems down the road, but it can be associated with that lawsuit, is that gonna be included as well?
Sure. So, you know, you're using the, the terms litigation and lawsuit and I, I wanna stress that a lot of our claims never make it to the actually filing of a lawsuit phase. Um, a lot of 'em can be resolved without ever having to file a lawsuit. Um, as part of our process, one of the things that we'll typically do, not always, but typically is we'll gather all the medical records and we'll put together a very comprehensive demand package, and we'll send that to the insurance adjuster.
Um, sometimes the demand package and the injuries are such that the insurance isn't enough to cover it all, and so they'll just tender their policy, they'll pay all of the policy limits. Other times we'll negotiate with them to a fair and reasonable settlement there. If we don't get to that point, then we have to file a lawsuit. A lot of cases get resolved without ever having to file a lawsuit. Mm-hmm. Um, I went off track and I've forgotten your question.
I was talking about if you start,
would it be included? Yes. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. So, so long as the treatment or the injury can be related to the crash, then 100% that's a part of your claim. Right now we've had people who have, you know, fallen after the fact and, and hurt a shoulder. Let's just. Okay, well then we ask clearly that wasn't caused in the car crash, the shoulder injury that was caused by the fall, but why did they fall?
Well, it's because they had a bum knee and their crutch went out from underneath them and they fell. I would argue that's absolutely related because, but before that crash, the crutch wouldn't be needed and the fall wouldn't have happened. And so, you know, there's some different, I guarantee you one, we'll probably look at that and say, uh, no, that's absolutely not included.
But that's definitely an, an argument that we can make and, and obviously we want to try to get as much included in there as possible and, and get our, get our clients, um, back to where they needed to be. And we always say prioritize our, our, one of our priorities. Our three priorities are first and foremost, get you healthy. Yeah. Uh, it doesn't matter how much money we put in your pocket, at the end of the day, if you're not healthy, Then you're not gonna be happy. Right?
Next is we wanna get everything paid for. We wanna make sure all your bills and costs and all that stuff is paid for. And then our third priority is to put money in your pocket. And so that's one of the things, I mean, when a client comes to us, um, they're interviewing us, we're also interviewing them, right? And if our priorities don't align, then we have other firms that we can send them to that would be more than happy to take their case. And, and they're good lawyers too.
Okay, great. I think this is like a lot of really great information, especially cuz a lot of the people that are act actually asking our questions. Other brain injury survivors. Sure. Cause it's like, where, where should I have started? So I do wanna remind everyone on the podcast right now that are listening to us, that are on any of the social medias, uh, to make sure to like us and share and subscribe to our podcast bind Waves.
We're here every Thursday, so don't forget us, and we will continue right now. All right. So, yeah. So one of the questions actually, I, I mean all the information you're giving right now, I'm super thankful for you coming here because. In resources that are necessary for others to hear, like if this happened, like, you know, or where to even start if something were to happen to me. So that's good.
Um, one of the questions that's also interesting as to why, why was this asked, but I think it's good. Um, so someone was like, in case, like what are the, um, what is needed to have been said to like an attorney if it's like a pro bono, like what is that? Is that even talked about? Yeah.
So, uh, in my world, none of our clients ever give us money. Okay. Okay. We work on what's called a contingency fee, meaning
Oh, okay.
Um, if you're injured, uh, we would agree to pursue your claim and we would get paid out of any settlement at the end of the day. If there's no settlement, then I've just done a whole bunch of work for nothing, right? So it's obviously in our best interest to make sure that we're taking good cases and that those cases resolve at the end of the day.
Um, for pro bono work, you know, there's, there's clinics, there's um, legal aid clinics all over the place that handle things like wills or family law issues or landlord tenant disputes, things like that. Um, so you could certainly go hit up one of those clinic. Um, in terms of pro bono work, I mean, it really kind of depends on what the issue is, right? Um, um, we were talking about this this morning in, in a networking group.
There's, there's not a lot of pro bono mergers and acquisitions groups, right? Like the business type stuff. Typically, it's going to be along the lines of those things I just mentioned. Maybe a bankruptcy, but probably not. Um, simply because those are expensive to, to prosecute and see through. Yeah. Um, but I'm not real sure of, of all the different areas that they would handle.
But personal injury is one of those where you don't really need a pro bono lawyer because you're not having to pay them out of pocket necessarily. Um, they're getting paid out of any settlement that they're able to do in the future.
Okay. That, that clears things up a little bit. So good.
Absolutely. So what do you, what's your most favorite thing about being a lawyer and what is your least favorite a lawyer?
Hmm. My most favorite thing about being a lawyer is, especially what I do, is. Uh, I really get to know clients.
Um, our whole team does, and I love, you know, I'll tell, I'll tell you this. Somebody asked my daughter a while back, what does your daddy do? And she kind of thought about it for a second and she said he helps people. Yeah. And, and I don't think there's any higher calling, right? Yeah. And so, uh, I love being able to help people and I get people a lot of times during one of the worst things that's ever happened to them in their.
And, you know, sometimes we're the closest to 'em, and so we can get the brunt of the anger and the, the emotions that go along with that. But being able to take somebody from that very first meeting where they're in all kinds of pain and, and suffering and hurting and, and turmoil in their lives, and walking them through the whole process where at the end of the. Everything is resolved there, as healthy as, as they're gonna be, uh, at least at that point.
And then providing them with the ability to move forward, I think is, is my favorite thing. Yeah. Uh, my least favorite thing is a lot of just the ridiculousness that goes along with being a lawyer. You know, I mean, and any profession, you're gonna have people on the other side who are just jerks. Yeah. Um, or you have antiquated rules, you know, the whole covid thing really.
Uh, my profession to get with it on the technology side, but there's still things that you just shake your head at and then, you know, the legislature, every two years we kinda all kinda hold our breath because we have no idea what they're gonna do. Mm-hmm. They don't know what they're gonna do, and a lot of times what they end up doing is not what they intended to do. Right. And so, yeah, that's probably the least favorite part.
Yeah. Nice to hear. I love that your daughter said like, you help people. That is so cute. Cause I totally imagined her doing that. Um, so right now, like obviously right now you're the vice president of the Board of Directors of Bind. I am. Like how did you get involved with, as is like with brain injury advocacy, like I think that's what you do. Sure. And you help people.
Yeah, absolutely. We help people. Um, so I was a psychology major in college. Uh, I'm, I'm Baylor grad, sic em Bears. And I love my neuroscience classes. The brain has always fascinated me. And so, um, as I ended up in, in the, the legal field, um, doing personal injury, one of the things that I love doing is helping brain injury survivors, right? People who have, uh, brain injuries from crashes or falls or, or whatever. We know falls are a big deal when it comes to, to brain.
And so I've always been, uh, really interested in the brain injury area. And then one of my best friends in the world, Russell Button, is a former bind board member. And as he rolled off, he introduced me to our former executive director of Valerie. And uh, we headed off, she invited me to join the board. And so that's how I ended up here.
Awesome. Yeah. Awesome.
Um, so if our listeners wanted to reach out to you, what be would be the best way for them to contact?
Yeah, so we are, we're all over the place. Uh, you can call us (214) 387-0387. Uh, snellings injury law.com is our website address. Uh, we're all over social media. Uh, Snellings Law is, is our firm name. And then Snelling's Injury Law is, is our internet address. Um, so yeah, those would be the the best ways for sure. Well,
thank you for joining us, Scott. And thanks, uh, to all of you for listening. All our guest information will be, uh, included in the episode's, descriptions as resources, and we'll just, we thank you very much for coming and sharing all that great information and just thank you.
Well, thank y'all for having me. It's been a pleasure and uh, y'all are doing a fantastic job. Keep it up. Thank you.
Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. And if you would like any more information other than from Scott, uh, for us, you can also contact. Here at Bind, um, through our email, which is bind waves@thebind.org. I don't know why I keep like double guessing that
like, I don't, I double guess my phone number as I was saying.
Oh yes, don't double guess that it's gonna be accessible right there.
And don't forget to like, share, subscribe, and also hit notify on your YouTube while you're listening to bindwaves
and, um, you can find us all over your favorite platforms. So, until next.
Bye
As the sound engineer, I'm going to interject here and say, uh, Snelling's Law is also one of our clubhouse partners and we'd thank them very much for being part of that. Yes. And anybody that's interested in being a clubhouse partner, uh, look on our website. We have all the information on how to become one.
Thank you