Latest / Elite Mindset Podcast / The Mindset Behind a $42.5 Million Settlement | Trent Kelly

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The Mindset Behind a $42.5 Million Settlement | Trent Kelly · Elite Mindset Podcast

• 0:00
  Brian Gomez: So, welcome to the Elite Mindset Podcast.
• 0:04
  Brian Gomez: And I want to give a little bit of context, context for why I started this pod podcast, why it's something that I think is really important to me, and why I hope it's something that people find value in.
• 0:15
  Brian Gomez: Is one of the things that I think about all the time when I drive past cities.
• 0:21
  Brian Gomez: Every city has like a different cityscape, right?
• 0:24
  Brian Gomez: Where you, you know, if you've traveled and you've been around cities, whether it's America or other places, you can look at a skyline and you can say, hey, that is the Austin skyline, that is the Dallas skyline, that is the Seattle skyline.
• 0:37
  Brian Gomez: And what comprises that skyline is these this eclectic combination of buildings that are all very, very different.
• 0:45
  Brian Gomez: And we kind of take for granted that, we take for granted like these architectural marvels that become a city's cityscape.
• 0:54
  Brian Gomez: And one of the things I think about all the time, whether it's the Space Needle in Seattle, the Empire State Building in New York, is I think about how that idea started as one person's idea.
• 1:10
  Brian Gomez: One person said, I'm gonna build a building that looks like this, the Birch Khalifa, whatever it may be.
• 1:16
  Brian Gomez: And then that one person took that idea and they brought all these people together and they created something that now became like a permanent fixture in an entire community and an entire society.
• 1:28
  Brian Gomez: And yet it all emanated from one person and one person's thought.
• 1:34
  Brian Gomez: And if you take that concept and you apply it to everything in life, it's also true.
• 1:39
  Brian Gomez: Literally every single thing, this microphone that I'm speaking into, the camera that I'm looking at right now, everything emanated from one person thinking something, believing it could happen.
• 1:49
  Brian Gomez: And then they went and made that a reality.
• 1:52
  Brian Gomez: And what I am fascinated by, I'm getting I'm energized, I'm inspired by is talking to people who, starting with their mindset, create exceptional outcomes.
• 2:05
  Brian Gomez: And that's really what this podcast is about.
• 2:08
  Brian Gomez: Is I've been privileged enough to know a lot of people who've done things like this, done exceptional things, created exceptional outcomes for themselves and for others.
• 2:16
  Brian Gomez: And yet those conversations, they die on the golf course.
• 2:19
  Brian Gomez: They die at a dinner table.
• 2:22
  Brian Gomez: Um, and it's great.
• 2:23
  Brian Gomez: It's great to have that information.
• 2:24
  Brian Gomez: But what I want to do is I want to invite people that I know on this podcast, talk to them, understand their mindset, and to share that with other people.
• 2:33
  Brian Gomez: Um, because I find that it's inspiring, I find that it's motivating for myself, and I think it's something good for us to think about is how do we cultivate a mindset that's gonna help us get the outcomes that we want out of life?
• 2:45
  Brian Gomez: So I'm excited.
• 2:47
  Brian Gomez: My first guest is a longtime friend.
• 2:49
  Brian Gomez: He started off as a client, has become a friend of mine.
• 2:52
  Brian Gomez: Trent Kelly's a personal injury lawyer based out of Austin, Texas.
• 2:55
  Brian Gomez: In my opinion, one of the best lawyers in the area.
• 2:58
  Brian Gomez: Um, and all these things that I just talked about, I feel are true of him.
• 3:02
  Brian Gomez: So I feel like he's a great person to have as my first guest guest on the podcast.
• 3:06
  Brian Gomez: So, Trent, welcome.
• 3:07
  Brian Gomez: Thank you for coming on and being my first guest.
• 3:09
  Trent Kelly: I appreciate that.
• 3:10
  Trent Kelly: And I think that's a great introduction.
• 3:12
  Trent Kelly: Um, I'm honored to be your first guest.
• 3:15
  Trent Kelly: I value the same things you do.
• 3:17
  Trent Kelly: I I know we've had a lot of discussions about this off-camera about elite mindset and how people achieve great outcomes through perseverance and originality and really just being themselves, being the true version of themselves.
• 3:34
  Trent Kelly: Uh, so I'm happy to be here with you today in your first episode to explore those topics and dig into that, like in a general sense, and also talk about how it impacts my practice and what we do at TK Injury Lawyers.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Awesome.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Well, let's get going, man.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: So um, and I'm gonna obviously we're gonna talk about stuff that I already know, conversations that we've had, but I want to share this with other people as well.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: Tell me, you know, there's a lot of personal injury lawyers, right?
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: You could throw a rock out the window and hit eight personal injury lawyers who are looking for people who are injured to help represent them.
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: Anyone in America, especially, knows that that's the case.
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: Tell me a little bit about you.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: Like what was your journey?
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: How did how did it how did how did you end up here?
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: How did you become Trent Kelly, the the personal injury trial lawyer?
• 4:21
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 4:21
  Speaker: So I think the story of how I became a lawyer and the story of our firm's success and how we approach cases is really kind of all the same story because it starts with like a small boy growing up in rural Arkansas who had nothing, basically, and who cultivated a chip on his shoulder.
• 4:46
  Speaker: Because I think from I grew up looking at people who I felt like had unfair advantages because of the position they were born into or the position they they had over others, whether it be monetary or whatever, whatever creates that imbalance of power.
• 5:00
  Speaker: That's something that has always bothered me from the beginning, as long as I can remember, feeling that there's some kind of injustice in the way uh outcomes are achieved for different people through no fault of their own.
• 5:15
  Speaker: So I think, I mean, you can talk, my parents would tell you that before I was probably 10 years old, I was already saying I was going to be a lawyer.
• 5:27
  Speaker: And I think the reason for that is because I saw that one person doing a good job for someone who's in a bad situation has the ability to right the wrongs of that imbalance and bring balance to an otherwise rigged system.
• 5:46
  Speaker: And I felt called to do that.
• 5:49
  Speaker: And so uh I went to law school with the idea of being a trial lawyer.
• 5:54
  Speaker: I never thought about being any other kind of lawyer.
• 5:57
  Speaker: Um, I was shocked when I got to law school that like 90% of the people I went to law school with were terrified to enter a courtroom.
• 6:04
  Speaker: You know, like I thought everybody was gonna be a trial lawyer when I went to law school.
• 6:09
  Speaker: Um, and so when I got there, it was a little jarring to me that you had all these people who were really focused and wanted to learn the information, wanted to become like scholars of the law.
• 6:22
  Speaker: But very few who had the wherewithal and drive who wanted to actually step into the arena and and fight for people, you know, using that knowledge.
• 6:35
  Speaker: So I think what I learned in law school was, you know, learning the law is really not that difficult, if I'm being, if I'm being honest.
• 6:44
  Speaker: I think a lot of people can know the law, especially these days where we have so much access to information online.
• 6:50
  Speaker: Uh, a lot of principles of law are accessible to lawyers and non-lawyers.
• 6:57
  Speaker: Anyone with a computer and a search engine can find out a lot of the information you learn in law school.
• 7:02
  Speaker: So, what separates lawyers, in my opinion, and in particular trial lawyers, uh, when they go into practice is their own personal experiences.
• 7:12
  Speaker: Like, what guides your moral compass?
• 7:14
  Speaker: Like, how do you approach a case based on uh is it about the client?
• 7:19
  Speaker: Is it about you and your ego?
• 7:21
  Speaker: Is it about your law firm?
• 7:23
  Speaker: For me, based on my experiences, I approach, I'm very client-focused because the chip that I grew up with on my shoulder, I apply that chip to every case, right?
• 7:34
  Speaker: And so what separates me in a field of a million screaming lawyers on TV and on billboards is that you don't get someone who just knows the law.
• 7:47
  Speaker: Because, like I said, that's that's a almost like a commodity.
• 7:50
  Speaker: What you get is someone who cares deeply about the wrong that has that you've suffered and who's gonna take it and make it personal for them and use the chip that I've been carrying my entire life to refuse to lose, essentially.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: So let me let me just ask some more questions about this chip, right?
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: Because a lot of people have a chip on their shoulder.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: Where did that so if I'm understanding what you're saying, it came from basically coming from a rough situation, right?
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: Talk to me about that chip.
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: What cultivated that chip?
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: What went into you developing that chip?
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: I know it wasn't as simple as you saw injustices in the world.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: I want to know more about that.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: I want to understand that better.
• 8:33
  Speaker: Yeah, okay.
• 8:33
  Speaker: So, like from personal experience, what cultivated the chip was I saw as a child, you know, you you can only focus on the things that you see in front of you.
• 8:45
  Speaker: Your universe is really small.
• 8:47
  Speaker: But there were things that were happening to people around me, people going on nice vacations that I couldn't go on, seeing things in the world that I thought I might not might not ever see, you know.
• 8:59
  Speaker: So it was like, it was this like feeling like when you grow up in a situation like that, especially in a small town where a lot of people don't make it out of that town.
• 9:09
  Speaker: And I'm not judging that.
• 9:11
  Speaker: I think small town America is great, and I have a lot of family and friends who still live where I grew up.
• 9:16
  Speaker: But for me, I felt like there's more to there's more to my story than what's happening here, right?
• 9:24
  Speaker: And I need to find a way to make that story a reality.
• 9:29
  Speaker: And so I think the chip was cultivated in that's not gonna happen based on my upbringing, my circumstances, not that's not gonna happen for me.
• 9:36
  Speaker: I've got to make that happen, right?
• 9:38
  Speaker: And so I used the disadvantages I had as an advantage, essentially, if that makes sense.
• 9:46
  Speaker: Like the things that I saw that were like I didn't have that I wanted, that I thought that I I certainly wanted for my children as when they became the age I was at the time.
• 9:56
  Speaker: Um, I felt like I'm gonna have to work really hard my entire life and separate myself because I come from a from an experience or a background where I'm not going to be given any advantages.
• 10:09
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 10:09
  Speaker: You know, I've got to earn all of this.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: And you know, just being candid, right?
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't look at you and think that.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: I would I wouldn't look at you and be like, man, this guy had to go uphill to get where he's at in life.
• 10:22
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 10:23
  Speaker: I I mean, I I'll take that as a compliment.
• 10:25
  Speaker: Thank you.
• 10:26
  Speaker: Uh but I think if you knew me when I was eight, nine, 10 years old, you would you would get it.
• 10:34
  Speaker: And you and I have had these conversations, you kind of know that the the granular details of that.
• 10:38
  Speaker: I'm not gonna go into that, but um, you know, it's it's more about a sense of I am I I'm gonna refuse to let someone else dictate the outcome for me.
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 10:52
  Speaker: You know, yeah, and that's how I approach every case.
• 10:56
  Speaker: I refuse to allow a defense attorney or an adjuster or some person who's sitting in a building somewhere trying to cover the bottom line for a multi-billion dollar corporation to get an advantage and to win a case that I know my clients are entitled to win.
• 11:12
  Speaker: So I just I just I think that the chip, if you want to call if you want to keep calling it a chip, I don't know, maybe there's a better word for it as we pivot.
• 11:22
  Speaker: I think chip's a good word.
• 11:23
  Speaker: As we pivot to this theme, but like it is a it is an embrace embracing discomfort, knowing that like every case, every case, I've been doing this for almost 20 years, every case has something new in it.
• 11:39
  Speaker: Uh, you're not gonna ever know everything about every law and every case and every situation.
• 11:45
  Speaker: It's embracing the fact that like I don't, I don't might, I might not know everything when I enter a case, but I know that I'm right.
• 11:52
  Speaker: And I know that I'm gonna fight like hell to prove that I'm right.
• 11:56
  Speaker: And if that means that we go to a courtroom, we tee it up with a jury and let a jury decide, then so be it.
• 12:02
  Speaker: But I'm not gonna sacrifice my comfort, meaning like that we're gonna sell a case quickly and for less money, uh, over my client's success and their ability to get what they're entitled to, which is always obviously gonna create a lot of discomfort for the attorney who's involved because you know it's easy for a personal injury lawyer to sign up a case, especially a good case, and sell it pretty quickly, right?
• 12:29
  Speaker: I mean, the insurance company knows they owe something.
• 12:31
  Speaker: Yeah, we see it all the time.
• 12:31
  Speaker: They know they owe something.
• 12:33
  Speaker: So uh there's a lot of lawyers who do what I do who might sign up a case and settle it for 10, 20% of what the actual value of the case is because they're afraid of the discomfort, right?
• 12:47
  Speaker: Like they don't want to go through that process and fight for their client and feel like this may take two years.
• 12:52
  Speaker: I'm carrying all these case expenses, the the the outcome is uncertain.
• 12:57
  Speaker: You know what I'm saying?
• 12:58
  Speaker: They're they're looking at, they're always looking at what are what am I risking personally to continue to fight for this client.
• 13:07
  Speaker: For me, I take it personally, but it's the opposite way.
• 13:12
  Speaker: You know, like there's nothing I'm not willing there that I'm not willing to do if if I feel think that we're in the right to fight for that client and to and to grow in the discomfort with them to get the outcome that they deserve.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: I I like I like the theme of discomfort because just personally, one of the things that I can share is like, man, I hate it when negative stuff happens to me.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: I hate it when I have to go through something that's difficult.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: Um, I think most people would agree with that.
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: I don't think that's a unique uh perspective.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: But yet, whenever I look back in my life and I say, like, well, why was I able, why was I able to have a good outcome when there have been good outcomes in my life?
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: Almost every single time I can point to like something really negative that like that that like became a motivating factor that taught me a lesson that I needed to learn.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: Um and so what I've learned, I've gotten older, and you, you know, you take your lumps, you have some wins and you have some losses, is I've learned that like when these bad things happen, rather than lament and like feel sorry for myself, how quickly can I pivot to what can I learn from this?
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: What can I take from this?
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: How can I use this as motivation, as feel whatever it is?
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: Like Michael Jordan was famous for being a guy that like he wanted you to talk trash to him because like he'd show, you know, this is a Tuesday night in Milwaukee.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: He can't get it up for playing against, like, like there's no stars on the team at that time, but yet a guy would talk trash to him, and now he's like, I'm gonna go get 60 on you now.
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: Now you've given him this motive, right?
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: So, like, that's like an exaggeration of what I'm describing.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: So, my question for you is this is a journey, right?
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: We talked about growing up in Arkansas, sort of the things that shaped your mindset, gave you this chip on your shoulder.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: What are some of the challenges that you've had in your career, especially early on, that you feel have helped mold you into the person you are now and the capabilities you have now as a trial attorney?
• 15:10
  Speaker: Yeah, so I mean, I think part of what motivates me as a trial lawyer and how I approach cases is the general mentality of not being afraid of risk.
• 15:21
  Speaker: And I think like, you know, leaving when I started this law firm, I left a very comfortable position, you know, that a lot of people would have stayed in because I had a good salary and I had a wife and um a baby who was two months old at the time.
• 15:41
  Speaker: Um but I felt like what was best for my career and my journey and my clients ultimately was for me to take that risk to go out on my own to be able to do things the way that I want them done.
• 15:56
  Speaker: Um so like I I I just there was no other way for me to handle this other than to take the risk and start my own shop.
• 16:04
  Speaker: Um and by doing that, I'm able to take risk on my clients that I might be told if I work for someone else that we're not gonna take.
• 16:13
  Speaker: Does that make sense?
• 16:15
  Speaker: Yeah, it does.
• 16:16
  Speaker: So when you're working at a big firm, um even some small firms, I think a lot of it's there, the law firms are hedging their own risk versus their clients' risk.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: What do you mean by that?
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: I don't I don't know what you mean by that.
• 16:30
  Speaker: I mean like time is money, especially in the law, right?
• 16:33
  Speaker: When you as a lawyer, you have nothing to sell other than your knowledge of the law, your experience, and your time.
• 16:39
  Speaker: That's it.
• 16:40
  Speaker: I don't have a product to sell you.
• 16:41
  Speaker: I that is my product.
• 16:43
  Speaker: And so there's only a finite amount of that that exists within a law firm, right?
• 16:48
  Speaker: So that's the intangible part of the risk is you put a lot of time and effort and energy into a case instead of other cases, and you don't get the outcome you want, and the firm loses money on it, right?
• 17:00
  Speaker: But then there's also tangible risk.
• 17:02
  Speaker: So it's to work this case up properly, we need to hire these experts, but they're really expensive.
• 17:12
  Speaker: And the defense attorney is saying he doesn't think we're gonna win, that they think we're gonna they're gonna get a summary judgment on us before trial anyway.
• 17:20
  Speaker: So we might be out all that money if that happens, if we buy into that bravado, right?
• 17:25
  Speaker: So I feel like most attorneys are are real scared of that when they, you know, they they love to work up a case until they meet a meet a wall that they have to climb over, or or even worse, if they have to run through a wall, right?
• 17:41
  Speaker: Because there's no way to get over it.
• 17:43
  Speaker: And so they take money they shouldn't take for a client because either the intangible risks are too high or the tangible risks are too high, or maybe a combination of both.
• 17:56
  Speaker: And so what that what that leads to is an outcome that's not anywhere close to what it should be for the client.
• 18:03
  Speaker: And so the way I look at that is I'm a risk taker.
• 18:08
  Speaker: Like I my entire life my success has been predicated on risk, whether it was uh, you know, going to law school without any family, you know, no ties to the law whatsoever.
• 18:23
  Speaker: I didn't have a dad who's a lawyer or an uncle or whomever.
• 18:26
  Speaker: Like I assumed a lot of debt that my parents couldn't pay, they didn't pay for my law school at the risk, betting on myself that I'm gonna be a good trial lawyer.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: I don't know if you'll relate to this, but like as you're saying this, like, oh, I obviously, you know, I'm listening to you and I'm like, okay, I relate to what you're saying.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: And like a way that I'm I I feel the same way is, you know, I didn't come from much.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Um, I wouldn't say I grew up poor, but I didn't have much, right?
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: And the expectations of me growing up were like, hey, like have a get a solid job, provide for your family, and not quite survive, but like, hey, that that's a good life.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: And and by the way, that is a good life.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: There's nothing wrong with that.
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: But I always wanted, I always wanted to like see what I could achieve.
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: And I've been driven to like try to be what I can.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: And one of the things when I've thought about risks, and I've been in these moments where I'm like, oh man, I gotta take this plunge or I gotta invest this, or whether it's time or money or effort, whatever it may be, um, you can obviously think about what might happen bad.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: But one of the things that helped me is like, I know what it feels like to have nothing.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I know what it's like, right to be worried how I'm gonna pay rent the next month.
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: And you know what?
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: I was still happy.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: I'm still happy and I still had buddies I could call and go have a beer, go shoot some hoops with.
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: I could still go for a run outside.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: I mean, there's there's so many things that are amazing in life that you can be grateful for, even whenever you know you're not in the best situation.
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: That I'm like, okay, if that's my floor, what's the worst that can happen to me?
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: And so what that's allowed me to do is like take risks in other situations because I'm not looking at this through this lens of I've got to build some empire, I gotta drive this car or that house.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: Like, that's not my motivation.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: My motivation is saying like, what I can, what am I capable of and how can I make the biggest impact?
• 20:20
  Speaker: Well, it's about being able to lay your head on the pillow at night and know you gave your best.
• 20:24
  Speaker: Yeah, you know, yeah, it's what it's like that's powerful stuff.
• 20:26
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 20:27
  Speaker: And if and I don't think I could lay my head on my pillow at night and think about the things I'm doing professionally and personally, you know, being a father and a husband and a lawyer.
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: Talk to me about that.
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: Like, talk to me.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: What does that feel like?
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: What is what is you laying your when you lay your head on your pillow and you're like, I feel like I left it all in the field and I gave everything I could.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: Tell me what does that look like?
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: What does that analysis look like in your head?
• 20:52
  Speaker: Well, I mean, I I'll say this, you know, there's no better feeling, I think.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:58
  Speaker: Win, lose, or draw.
• 20:59
  Speaker: You know, if you if you if you put your best product on the field and you played every down with the like the aggression and tenacity and and spirit and energy you had, and you got whooped, and you got whooped, you know, but you can sleep at night knowing that you didn't hold a punch, that there there wasn't a play that you kept in the book that you could have used that you didn't try, you know, and so I guess for me it's about hard work, but also creativity, you know, in a way, like thinking outside the box with like professionally, thinking like, what have I have I thought about every possible way to achieve the best result in this case?
• 21:44
  Speaker: Right.
• 21:44
  Speaker: So there many times, and I'm sure a lot of my colleagues feel the same way.
• 21:50
  Speaker: Uh, that like I I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about my cases.
• 21:54
  Speaker: Of course.
• 21:55
  Speaker: You know, like I wake up, especially when a lot's on The line, like sweating, you know, dreaming about cases.
• 22:04
  Speaker: Because like I'm that personally invested in it.
• 22:07
  Speaker: And so there there are times when I think about something in the middle of the night, you know, and that could really be helpful to a case.
• 22:15
  Speaker: And and it's I gotta remember that for the next day because it's crucial that I use every tool I got in my tool belt to help people.
• 22:25
  Speaker: And like I said, I mean, I'm this is a being a trial lawyer is not a destination, it's a it's a journey.
• 22:31
  Speaker: As cliche as that is, I'm learning every day, I'm becoming a different version of myself, hopefully a better version.
• 22:36
  Speaker: The more experiences I have, whether they're wins or losses or whatever, whatever they are, they go into shape you into the best version of yourself, to your point.
• 22:48
  Speaker: And I just think like you and I have talked about before, if you've got to be willing to bet on yourself in all situations, right?
• 22:58
  Speaker: Like if you're walking into a courtroom or a boardroom or an interview for your first job at McDonald's, like if you don't walk in there thinking I'm the person for this job or I'm the person who's here to achieve this result for someone else or for myself today, and that I and by God, I I'm gonna do it or I'm gonna get it, then you shouldn't show up.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, who who if you can't believe in yourself, then who's gonna believe you and who's gonna believe in you, right?
• 23:28
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 23:28
  Speaker: So I think uh you know, betting on yourself has enormous power in terms of broad stroke, is a lot of people don't achieve the outcomes they want in life, not just cases in a courtroom, but just generally speaking, because they're terrified of if I do bet on myself and I'm wrong, it's scary.
• 23:54
  Speaker: What's the result?
• 23:54
  Speaker: It's scary.
• 23:55
  Speaker: Is it is it I'm I'm homeless?
• 23:57
  Speaker: Is it uh I lose this big case and $250,000 I've got invested in my own money?
• 24:05
  Speaker: You know, like is it I my company value goes down uh because I made a bad move here and like I got to answer to a board or my co-owners and and face the music on that?
• 24:17
  Speaker: I think those are real concerns for sure.
• 24:20
  Speaker: Like I'm not I'm not downplaying or marginalizing people's fear.
• 24:25
  Speaker: What I'm saying is to have an elite mindset, I to me, the cornerstone of that is to embrace the fear.
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: I agree.
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: I agree 100%.
• 24:35
  Speaker: You just have to accept it as part of your daily life.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: You know, it's like hey, it's like the scene in the in uh The Dark Knight Rises, whenever like uh Batman's fighting Bane.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: This is kind of a dumb analogy.
• 24:49
  Speaker: This is the third one.
• 24:49
  Speaker: Yeah, this I don't think I ever got through this.
• 24:51
  Speaker: I've tried to watch it a couple of times, I think I've fallen asleep, but it's so good, dude.
• 24:54
  Speaker: You gotta watch it.
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: Okay, but there's a scene whenever you know Batman exists in the shadows, and that's like his that's his advantage at fighting, and so he's fighting Bane.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: And I'm not gonna try to do the Bane voice, especially not on camera, but but he like he like starts to use some of his like trickery on Bane, and he's like, uh, I was born in the darkness.
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: He goes, I I've embraced it.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: You know, he goes, it wasn't till and he says something to the effect of like like I was so used to, I was actually blinded by the light.
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: And that's what made Bane so scary, is like he embraced the darkness.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: And I completely agree with you is like as humans, we're we're very much programmed to be to be fear-aversed, to take the safe way out, yeah.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: And what I've learned time and time and time again is the good stuff, even for the people you admire, the good stuff is on the other side of that fear.
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: It I mean, it just is.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: You know, you're talking about going to sleep at night and that it's the best feeling in the world.
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: I the the I'm I'm way over my sports analogy quota for the for the episode.
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: Okay, but when I when I hear that, I'm gonna tell you something that like it's one of my favorite sports moments of all time, man.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: Kobe Bryant, one of the all-time greatest athletes, all-time elite mindset, I think everyone would agree.
• 26:15
  Speaker: I think about Kobe all the time.
• 26:16
  Speaker: Freaking in practicing law.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: Love Kobe.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: There's Kobe died, you know, like, you know, you don't have a con I've never had like a like a connection to celebrities or anything like that.
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: When Kobe died, that was like the first celebrity death that just crushed me.
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: It just crushed me in every way.
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: And I went back and watched his last game against Utah.
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: It's a meaningless game, end of the regular season.
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: It's his last game.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: He's like, what, 36, 37 years old, something like that.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: Um and it was just one of those nights where everybody came to celebrate him.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: It was on national TV, Snoop Dogg, Shaq is in the audience, everybody's there to bid him farewell.
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: He could have got out, got his quiet 23 points, gets got subbed out early, and just waved to the crowd, and everyone would have gave him a standing O.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: What does he do?
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: The dude comes out firing like it's game seven of the NBA Finals, scores 63 points, ends up winning, hits the game, like the game-deciding shot on Gordon Hayward.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: And then like they call timeout after that play.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: I'll never forget it.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: Uh and maybe somebody can look at it, I don't know.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: But there's a scene where after they call timeout, and this guy's at the end of the rope, man.
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: This guy's a champion, and he's he's the old dog.
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: And he's sitting on the bench, he's got the towel draped over him, and he's just staring at the ground, and he's completely empty.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: His tank is completely empty.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: I went back and watched that game after he died, and I swear when I see that scene, I get emotional because I'm like, that is what it's about.
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: It's about giving everything that you have to give.
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: Contracts and dude, the guys made a ton of money.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: And as you know, like in every business, there's money to be made and families to get fed, and all that matters.
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: I'm not saying it doesn't matter, but like for me, what it's all about is it's about being able to sit on that bench and just be exhausted and say, I did my best, win, lose, or draw, like you said.
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: And man, I gotta tell you, that feeling feels better than any car I've ever driven in or any house I've ever lived in, or anything.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: That is like that is very, very uh motivating for me.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: And like I love hearing you talk about that.
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: It's like one of the reasons why I want to have conversations with people, like, because I know I obviously I know you've known you for a long time, but I want to tell those stories.
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: I want to hear those stories, I want to be inspired by those stories.
• 28:34
  Speaker: Yeah, and I'll say, I'll add something to that too, that I think about differently with Kobe.
• 28:39
  Speaker: And I talk to my kids about this a lot, is how people want to look at what Kobe was able to achieve.
• 28:46
  Speaker: And the thing that I think that Kobe embodies the most is this idea of if you just saw him play basketball, you would think, what a gifted individual.
• 28:58
  Speaker: What a person who just had everything line up for them, who was born into this body and mentality or whatever that could just walk onto a basketball court and dominate any opponent in any situation.
• 29:12
  Speaker: But the reality is that's that's no, that doesn't exist, right?
• 29:17
  Speaker: Like that is a packaged form of someone that we see out of our own probably thoughts that we could never achieve that.
• 29:26
  Speaker: So we have to explain it in a way that doesn't hurt our own egos.
• 29:30
  Speaker: Yeah, it feels better to think that.
• 29:31
  Speaker: Yeah, to think like, oh, well, he just had all these abandoned.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: If I was six foot six, I could do that too.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, could you?
• 29:36
  Speaker: Right?
• 29:36
  Speaker: Yeah, no, I couldn't.
• 29:38
  Speaker: I could, but it the reason I say that is because so much of success in outcomes and life, and however you want to apply it, is all of the work that goes into something when no one's watching.
• 29:52
  Speaker: It's the grind.
• 29:53
  Speaker: Yes, it's the grind.
• 29:54
  Speaker: And like a lot of people just don't have the grind in them.
• 29:59
  Speaker: They just don't.
• 30:00
  Speaker: The majority of people don't have it, right?
• 30:03
  Speaker: Our industry is and because it's uncomfortable, right?
• 30:08
  Speaker: Yeah, it's uncomfortable to grind, it's uncomfortable to bust your ass, you know, night and day, outwork, try to outsmart everybody, and and not and not know what the outcome's gonna be.
• 30:21
  Speaker: Because it's not the grind doesn't have an immediate payout.
• 30:25
  Speaker: Like you don't, you don't get this instant gratification from working harder than someone else.
• 30:31
  Speaker: That's a long play.
• 30:33
  Speaker: You know, and I think if Kobe had anything, it was just the the wherewithal to understand that like whether I ever achieve greatness in this game, I'm gonna, I'm damn sure gonna work as hard as I can to make sure I'm the best version of me that steps onto the court.
• 30:53
  Speaker: And, you know, he famously would say, you know, if you get up an hour before everybody and you you're playing an hour before, and then you stay an hour later, and you then think about how those hours of practice accumulate over a lifetime or a career.
• 31:06
  Speaker: And so uh whenever one of my kids who don't have thankfully the same pains that I did growing up has some setback or an outcome they don't want, you know, I always or very frequently at least reference Kobe with them and say, like, you got to work harder.
• 31:26
  Speaker: You know, like these these outcomes that you want, you're you're entitled to those if you believe you're entitled to them and you put the effort in to actually get the result, right?
• 31:36
  Speaker: Absolutely.
• 31:36
  Speaker: Those things have to be married together.
• 31:38
  Speaker: There's no, there's no no one's gonna hand you anything.
• 31:41
  Speaker: I don't care who you are.
• 31:43
  Speaker: I mean, maybe there's some exceptions, obviously.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: If you're but you don't want to be one of those, you don't want to be one of the I think if you're one of those exceptions, I think that is a curse.
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: And we have so many examples we can look at and say, this person has everything, they're miserable.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: They're miserable.
• 31:56
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Misery is not something I would wish on anybody, right?
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: Like you don't want to be that exception.
• 32:01
  Speaker: No, you want to know to your to your point earlier, that you gave everything you had that day.
• 32:07
  Speaker: And when you lay your head down on the pillow at night, largely from exhaustion, but also because of contentment, that you can fall fast asleep without much effort at all because you have nothing that that you're regretful of for the for the actions you took that day.
• 32:25
  Speaker: I mean, that's the goal, right?
• 32:26
  Speaker: It's never perfect.
• 32:28
  Speaker: It's no, I don't think anybody could sit here and and honestly say that, oh yeah, every night I lay my head on my pillow.
• 32:34
  Speaker: I think I gave 100% today.
• 32:35
  Speaker: If you say that you're lying.
• 32:37
  Speaker: But but that it's not about perfection.
• 32:40
  Speaker: It's about like recognizing perfection, imperfection, rather, and trying to be better the next day.
• 32:46
  Speaker: Like every day I try to reset my goals and expectations for myself that whatever happened yesterday doesn't define me, whether it was like great or not so great, somewhere in between there, wherever it falls on the gradient, like that that's over, right?
• 33:05
  Speaker: Like tomorrow is a new day.
• 33:07
  Speaker: Tomorrow is an and I tell my I always tell my kids, you may do this too.
• 33:11
  Speaker: I say we need to look at everything as an opportunity.
• 33:14
  Speaker: You know, like I that's a big word that I use in my kids.
• 33:17
  Speaker: This is an opportunity.
• 33:19
  Speaker: And I think that when you're in stressful situations or high-risk situations, or you really want something, and you're you're putting it all on the line, and that creates anxiety or nervousness or whatever.
• 33:31
  Speaker: Part of what brings me back to being grounded in contentment is to tell myself the reason that you're all worked up about this is because this is an opportunity.
• 33:44
  Speaker: And like you don't, you're not guaranteed any opportunities in your life.
• 33:49
  Speaker: You have one right here in front of you, right now.
• 33:52
  Speaker: Make the most of it.
• 33:53
  Speaker: It's like uh, I don't know, do you know who Jocko Willink is?
• 33:57
  Speaker: No.
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: Um ex-military guy.
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: Now he's like a business consultant.
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Um, he has an ex he has an expression and he he's he has some really good books.
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: One is about ownership, fantastic, extreme ownership, one of my favorite books.
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: But he has this like story he tells about about the word good.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: And he talked about being in the military and how like when bad things would happen, he would always say good, good.
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: And they'd be like, What the heck?
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Why are you saying good?
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: This is bad.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: I heard that.
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: He'd be like, good, well, now we can get better, like it's raining today, and we can't go on this mission, good.
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: Now we can train, or this bad outcome happened, good.
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: Now we can learn from that.
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: And um that is such a weapon because nobody wakes up saying, I hope it rains today, I have a tea time with all my buddies, I want to go play golf.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: Nobody intuitively says, Well, I'm glad it's raining.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: But like when you can learn to approach the challenges of life and say, Good, good, how do I take from this?
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: In my opinion, in my experience, your walking example of that is it becomes a utility that you can now apply to everything.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: And now you're like, okay, bring it on.
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: Like, whatever it is, and I mean, granted, I don't want anything bad to happen to me.
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: I'm not asking for sure catastrophe, right?
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: But but whatever it is, I will find the silver lining and I will somehow come out the other side of this strong in that.
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: And I think that that's a tool that applies to everything, no matter what you do.
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: I think it especially applies to trial lawyers.
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: Um, and I think it's I think it's essential for us to teach our kids that.
• 35:34
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 35:34
  Speaker: And I think, you know, it's interesting.
• 35:37
  Speaker: I think I've always been that way.
• 35:39
  Speaker: You know, when you when you say golf, it kind of jolted this memory into my brain of, you know, did you happen to play college golf or something?
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: Uh yeah, a little bit.
• 35:49
  Speaker: But that's not even what it is.
• 35:50
  Speaker: It's about being a kid growing up in a small town, and we had a with they we had what they called a country club.
• 35:58
  Speaker: You know, it's not what you would think about in terms of a country club.
• 36:02
  Speaker: Uh, you know, it was 11, if anyone knows anything about golf, it's an 11-hole course, which I'm sure you never very few people listening would have ever heard of.
• 36:13
  Speaker: But all of that aside, it was a place, like I was drawn to golf when I was young, and I think about it sometimes, like from an introspective point of view, like what what drew me to it?
• 36:29
  Speaker: You know, what did I like about it over all these other sports that I played all throughout my life?
• 36:34
  Speaker: It was pretty decent at why did I focus on what golf?
• 36:37
  Speaker: Why, and I think it's because there's extreme ownership in golf.
• 36:41
  Speaker: You're on an island.
• 36:43
  Speaker: It's you, buddy.
• 36:44
  Speaker: You know, it's like it's you and the golf ball and the hole, wherever it might be, and how many times you're gonna have to swat it to get it into the hole, you know, and like there's no one else to blame for whatever happens.
• 36:58
  Speaker: You don't have a teammate or a coach that you can say, well, I would have done this, but they they did that.
• 37:03
  Speaker: So a lot of what what maybe what I thought about when you mentioned it earlier about having a tea time rained out, I remember what and I talk at my my oldest son is a golfer, and he's just starting to want to be competitive and play hard and all those things.
• 37:19
  Speaker: So we talk about this sometimes.
• 37:21
  Speaker: I remember when I was a kid, maybe 13 years old.
• 37:26
  Speaker: If it were raining outside, I would say, good, I'm gonna go.
• 37:32
  Speaker: I know the golf course is empty, it's not closed.
• 37:36
  Speaker: You were a little juco, it's not it's not lightning, so there's no there's no danger.
• 37:41
  Speaker: But I'm gonna go play in the rain because I guarantee you there's gonna be a time in my life in the future where I'm in the middle of a golf tournament and it's gonna start raining.
• 37:52
  Speaker: And I'm gonna have an advantage over all of my competitors who've always just said, Oh, it's raining, I'll just stay home today.
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: But isn't it wild, Trent, how that lesson that you learned as a kid it only it only applied to golf in that moment, right?
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: But it now applies to everything.
• 38:10
  Speaker: That's right.
• 38:10
  Speaker: And that's why I bring it up, is because I sort of hadn't thought about it that way until you mentioned golf and the conversation we're having now is I do think that I was already thinking about these things back then, and I have modified the what the application of the mindset, but the mindset has remained the same, which is I'm gonna lean into difficult things because running away from them is not gonna benefit me.
• 38:40
  Speaker: And if anything, it's gonna expose me at some point.
• 38:45
  Speaker: So I'm gonna deal with it now, even though it might be painful, because later, when it matters, I'll be ready.
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: And listen, man, I've known you for a long time.
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: And I don't know if I don't know if you're aware of this, but I'm just gonna give you my perspective.
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: What you're articulating, this scrappiness and this fight that you have, and this like righteous indignance about injustice, that to me is what makes you different, in my opinion.
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: I mean, I work with a lot of lawyers.
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: I work with some really talented lawyers, some of the most, some of the best trial lawyers in the country, right?
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: And one of the things I've always admired about you is you have this like fight.
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: You're like a lot of the there's a lot of scorekeeping with in in in any industry, right?
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: I'm not gonna single out legal, but there's a lot of scorekeeping of like, oh, you see what this guy did, you see what that guy did.
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: And there's to me, there's a lot of ego in that, as you know.
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: And some of it's useful, some of it's there's some utility in that.
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: But one thing I really like about you, have always admired about you, Trent, is like you just to use a simple expression, like you keep the main thing, the main thing.
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: Like you're just kind of like, whatever, like I can sift through this guy and what that, like I'm focused on this outcome for this client.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: And it's like a singular focus.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: And I think, and and I think that scrappiness and that grinder mindset for right up for right up for for maybe it's a wrong choice of words, but like that to me is something I think is very unique about you.
• 40:12
  Speaker: Well, thanks.
• 40:13
  Speaker: I appreciate that.
• 40:14
  Speaker: I I'll take that compliment and I I'll say that I aspire to be what you're describing.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: You are, dude.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: Dude, I know you.
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: I know you really well.
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: That's I'm telling you that like you got this fight in you that I think makes you uh it makes you uniquely empathetic.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: And it also, you know, let's let's be let's be real.
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: Like a lot of there's a lot of lawyers who are very successful who are fantastic businessmen, fantastic marketers.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: God bless fantastic lawyers, fantastic businessmen and fantastic marketers, nothing wrong with that.
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: But in legal specifically, and I this applies to other professions as well, but my my experiences in legal is like there's something to be said for like that purist who's like, I'm I'm about the grind, I'm about the outcome, I'm about justice, I'm about my clients.
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: And I think that's something you got, and I'm not saying you don't give yourself credit for that, but I think that's something that I don't know if you realize how unique that is about you because like as someone who talks to a lot of lawyers, and I mean I've literally talked to you know 20 lawyers a week in some capacity or another.
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: And again, a lot of them are fantastic.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: This is not to besmirch anybody, but like that's something that when I talk to you, I'm like, man, Trent is all about that life, man.
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: And I respect it.
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: I think it's admirable.
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: It's admirable because it's what's right for the client.
• 41:37
  Speaker: It is what's right for the client.
• 41:38
  Speaker: And I try to make all my decisions based on that light post of is this best for the client?
• 41:46
  Speaker: Ultimately, you know, like I said, that that's where the pain and the risk and all those things might scare some other lawyers.
• 41:52
  Speaker: But for me, I couldn't lay my head on my pillow at night and go to sleep knowing that I sacrificed some outcome for my comfort.
• 42:03
  Speaker: And so I'm just not gonna do that.
• 42:05
  Speaker: Now, uh, you know, like you said, there's a lot of lawyers out there who are great marketers and have gotten it can hang a bunch of numbers on the wall because they've cast such a broad net and brought in all these cases.
• 42:21
  Speaker: And I'm not gonna say anything negative about any particular law firm.
• 42:24
  Speaker: I would never do that, but I think there's a reality that we have to accept, which is how many cases did they basically give some small amount of effort to because they didn't feel like it was worth their time.
• 42:39
  Speaker: So they could just get to the big case, you know, like it was like these cases, these individuals are a means to an end.
• 42:49
  Speaker: And the end is some big number I'm trying to get, some big case I'm trying to get.
• 42:54
  Speaker: Whereas, no, like the way I look at it, and I couldn't look at it any other way because I I come from that background, like every case is an in and of itself.
• 43:03
  Speaker: You know, it's like every client has like that's somebody's life hanging in the balance.
• 43:09
  Speaker: Yes, right.
• 43:09
  Speaker: This is their worst, and I'll give you one better.
• 43:12
  Speaker: It's not just their, it's just not an individual.
• 43:15
  Speaker: It's like this is an individual who is completely vulnerable, and this is the worst, maybe the worst thing they've ever experienced in their life.
• 43:21
  Speaker: You know, like, and they don't know what to do.
• 43:26
  Speaker: And they're putting all of that, all of that in your lap and saying we trust you to do what's right for us.
• 43:34
  Speaker: That's that's an immense amount of responsibility.
• 43:37
  Speaker: And what does that feel like for you?
• 43:39
  Speaker: It depends, it depends on the day, I think.
• 43:42
  Speaker: Honestly, if I'm being honest.
• 43:43
  Speaker: Uh, some days it feels more manageable than others.
• 43:47
  Speaker: I mean, I can tell you that the await can be immense.
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 43:51
  Speaker: Um, that's why I think that uh a lot of lawyers are sociopaths because they they don't carry that.
• 43:59
  Speaker: Weight with them.
• 44:00
  Speaker: And I guess in some ways, like maybe I should be envious of that.
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: But I'm I'm clearly I think you know you should be.
• 44:09
  Speaker: I'm clearly clearly not a sociopath.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 44:11
  Speaker: Uh and I carry it, I carry the weight of all my cases all the time.
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: How do you manage that?
• 44:18
  Speaker: Uh I don't know.
• 44:20
  Speaker: As carefully as I can while still maintaining the same level of intensity.
• 44:24
  Speaker: Do you mean not a healthy way?
• 44:26
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 44:26
  Speaker: Honestly.
• 44:27
  Speaker: If I'm being completely transparent, I probably don't carry it as healthily as healthily for myself as I should.
• 44:34
  Speaker: But to me, it's what I signed up for.
• 44:38
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 44:39
  Speaker: You know?
• 44:40
  Speaker: Yeah, I respect that.
• 44:41
  Speaker: It's what I signed up for.
• 44:42
  Speaker: If if you don't like it, get out, get out.
• 44:44
  Speaker: Or find, I guess, find a different way to cope with it.
• 44:47
  Speaker: Unfortunately, I think or settle every case.
• 44:49
  Speaker: Or settle every case.
• 44:51
  Speaker: And don't have have those pain points that keep you up.
• 44:54
  Speaker: But I mean, for me, it's like I think that would be uh the the weight that I carry would be heavier if I settled every case.
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 45:02
  Speaker: Does that make sense?
• 45:03
  Speaker: Of course.
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: Because it would I would feel you would you would be going to sleep at night the opposite way that we just talked about, where you said I didn't leave it all on the field.
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: I didn't give my team their all.
• 45:14
  Speaker 2: I I didn't I wasn't, you know, one of my favorite quotes um is what a man can be, he must be.
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: And I believe that's the burden.
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: That's the burden of every human being.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: It's the burden that we all carry.
• 45:29
  Speaker 2: And some of us can be more.
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: And listen, nobody's asking you to be more than what you can be.
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: It's what you can be, you must be.
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: And so to me, what you're describing is like, hey, I know I can, I know I if I give my all, I can create a good outcome or at least sleep at night knowing that I didn't.
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: But if you don't do that, that's a curse.
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: And that goes back to the people I was talking about before who like you don't want to be these people who are given everything.
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: You don't want to be these people who life seems like it's so convenient.
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: Um, these Nepo babies that I actually feel sorry for them, right?
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: You want to be somebody who's earned your right and can say, hey, I'm making the world around me a better place.
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: I'm helping people.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: If not for me, there's less light in this world, right?
• 46:11
  Speaker: Yeah, I think that's right.
• 46:13
  Speaker: And I think also carrying that weight and approaching all my cases with the same level of intensity, even though that might affect me mentally and emotionally, you know, on a personal level, it is a is a gift to me in the sense that regardless of the type of case it is, right?
• 46:34
  Speaker: Because there are different types of cases.
• 46:37
  Speaker: There are cases where people have suffered greater harms than others.
• 46:40
  Speaker: That's a fact.
• 46:41
  Speaker: Not trying to pretend like every case is the same.
• 46:44
  Speaker: But if you approach a smaller case, a case with less damages, a case where someone's life has not been turned upside down, maybe they they were in a crash and they're certainly hurt and they've had they have damages, they've had to see a doctor, they have injuries.
• 46:59
  Speaker: If you approach that case differently, fundamentally differently, than you do a massive catastrophic injury case, then I think that you're not as good in the big case as you would be because you're less practiced in the way that you're gonna approach it.
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: Well, look, look, that's a perfect segue, right?
• 47:22
  Speaker 2: Because, you know, one of the things that's happened recently for you is you recently got a really great outcome in a really big case here in Texas.
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: Um I think that's a perfect segue to talk about that.
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: I want to know more about that case.
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: Tell me a little bit about that case.
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: Tell me about some of the challenges of it and like what what what details you can share about if you don't mind.
• 47:42
  Speaker: Sure.
• 47:43
  Speaker: So uh this was a partially confidential result.
• 47:49
  Speaker: So there are things I can't say.
• 47:51
  Speaker: Um, so I'll put that out there.
• 47:52
  Speaker: I'm not trying to be uh, I'm not trying to obfuscate anything.
• 47:56
  Speaker: You know, I'm just uh I'll tell you.
• 47:59
  Speaker: So I've represented, had the the honor to represent a couple of very nice, deserving women who lost a loved one who was uh a father and a husband in a in a really bad car crash uh that happened here in Texas.
• 48:19
  Speaker: It was caused by a commercial vehicle.
• 48:21
  Speaker: Um, and it took almost two and a half years to get that case resolved.
• 48:27
  Speaker: So you know, I've been carrying that for a long time and walking this path with my clients.
• 48:32
  Speaker: Um ultimately, based on the work that we did, we were able to get my clients 42 and a half million dollars.
• 48:41
  Speaker: Um and I'm sure you can guess without me telling you that the insurance company doesn't want to pay forty-two and a half million dollars, regardless of what happened in a case.
• 48:52
  Speaker: And um, you know, that that result is I'm very proud of that, mostly for my clients, because too often when really awful things happen, people are they're suffering and their damages are minimalized.
• 49:08
  Speaker: And even a what seems on the surface to be a good result is not the deserve the result that they deserve.
• 49:16
  Speaker: Um I can say that this is the this is a this is a result.
• 49:23
  Speaker: Now it's not gonna ever money never brings a person back, it never takes suffering away, it never takes grief.
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they would they would gladly trade that money for it.
• 49:31
  Speaker 2: Of course they would.
• 49:32
  Speaker: Yes, yes, absolutely.
• 49:34
  Speaker: Um but it adds insult to injury literally and figuratively in this case, when basically everything you've known for your life is taken from you.
• 49:47
  Speaker: And then what's given to you to try to replace that is so minimal that it's like it's not even a real outcome for you.
• 49:58
  Speaker: Like nothing has changed, you know.
• 50:00
  Speaker: Really, I tell my clients like really bad things happen to really good people, unfortunately.
• 50:07
  Speaker: That's just the nature of the world that we live in that happens all the time.
• 50:11
  Speaker: And it's not my place to undo what's been done.
• 50:17
  Speaker: I can't do that.
• 50:17
  Speaker: I wish I could.
• 50:18
  Speaker: But it is my job to try to go out there and get the best result that is available to us within the judicial system in the United States that can try to add something good from something horrible, right?
• 50:35
  Speaker: Whether that means um life is a little more comfortable while you grieve or while you recover, or you can send your kids to college and pay for it now, whereas you couldn't do that before.
• 50:48
  Speaker: I want to there's always to be, at the end of the day, I feel that I brought the value to a case where I I get someone in a really bad situation, I get them as close as I can to where they were before in terms of their medical, physical recovery.
• 51:06
  Speaker: And then and ultimately in the in the result, whether it be a settlement or a verdict, that it is as close to their true measure to the extent you can quantify these things, right?
• 51:17
  Speaker: True measure of damages is possible.
• 51:20
  Speaker: And I'll fight for that until I feel like we're there, you know, and that's that's what happened with this case is very early on in the case, sure, there were there were discussions about much less money.
• 51:35
  Speaker: There was still a lot of money though.
• 51:37
  Speaker: A lot of money.
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: Were you tempted to take it?
• 51:43
  Speaker: I was interested in hearing the offers.
• 51:47
  Speaker: I'll say that.
• 51:48
  Speaker: You know, like one of the one of the hard things about what we do is when you when you have a situation where it's it feels weird even saying this, where you have the the benefit of not being limited by the resources on the other side, right?
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: That was and that was a situation.
• 52:06
  Speaker: Yeah, that was one of these situations.
• 52:07
  Speaker: And I'll be, you know, I want to be transparent about that.
• 52:10
  Speaker: There's a lot of I've had a lot of cases in my career where people have lost a husband or a child or uh uh a brother, what whomever, a significant other, a loved one, and they're a wrongful death beneficiary, they show up and they say, uh, you know, this happened to me, and we investigate that and we put all of our effort and energy into it.
• 52:32
  Speaker: We lean into it in the ways that we practice that we've talked about already.
• 52:35
  Speaker: And the result is not what we want because there simply isn't the there aren't the resources on the other side that are available.
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: Explain that, if you will, for people who don't understand that, Trent, because I I'll tell you like one of the things you see on social media is you see people like having conversations when something happens, like a McDonald's employee like punches a customer and the comments are like, oh, that's a lawsuit.
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: And you're kind of like being in the know to some degree that I am, just from being adjacent to the legal profession or being in the legal profession, is you know, like, hey, like, so anyway, I'll you're the expert here.
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: Talk, explain to people what you mean by that, resources on the other side, what that means.
• 53:16
  Speaker: So, in a normal car crash that let's say doesn't involve a commercial vehicle or a commercial entity at all, let's say it's you, me, I I'm looking at the colour.
• 53:25
  Speaker 2: The Toyota Prius.
• 53:26
  Speaker: We're looking at my phone driving down I-35 and here in Austin, you're stopped because traffic is always stopped, and I and I hit you really hard from behind.
• 53:35
  Speaker: Okay.
• 53:36
  Speaker: Basically, unless I'm a wealthy individual that owns multiple vacation homes or expensive boats or things like that, I'm of what we call judgment proof.
• 53:47
  Speaker: You're not gonna get any money from me ever.
• 53:49
  Speaker: There's I'm never gonna make the money that you would need to get from me to have a meaningful result.
• 53:55
  Speaker: Number one.
• 53:56
  Speaker: And number two, it's all exempt from what we call exempt from judgment.
• 54:00
  Speaker: Okay.
• 54:01
  Speaker: So, like a normal job, a couple of cars, you know, a house, even a even a very expensive house if it's homesteaded here in Texas, it's it's just judgment proof.
• 54:11
  Speaker: Um, so in those situations, you're really looking at how much insurance is there?
• 54:16
  Speaker: That's your source of recovery, you know, and that's something we don't get to tell juries, by the way, you know, that there's insurance, which I disagree with, like emphatically, and wish I could change that.
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: Or imagine the insurance industry has lobbied pretty hard for that law.
• 54:30
  Speaker: They have a lot of money and they do a really good job with that.
• 54:33
  Speaker: But it's just one of those injustices that when you walk into a courtroom, not only are you tasked with, as the plaintiff, proving every element of your case, that you have the full burden of everything.
• 54:47
  Speaker: The defense just has to poke a little hole here and there and they might win, right?
• 54:52
  Speaker: You got to prove everything, but also you've got to get a jury who's looking at a defendant who might look very sympathetic, who's gonna take the stand and say, you know what?
• 55:01
  Speaker: I admit that I did it, but I'm so sorry for it.
• 55:04
  Speaker: And they're like, and they see themselves in that person.
• 55:07
  Speaker: They think, I don't want to ruin this.
• 55:09
  Speaker: Like this, this clearly the plaintiff has been damaged.
• 55:12
  Speaker: But like, do do two harms make a whole?
• 55:16
  Speaker: You know, am I gonna now ruin this person's life and put some huge number on them that they have to pay to this person and now they're bankrupt and destitute and all those things?
• 55:26
  Speaker: Like, I think they see themselves in that.
• 55:28
  Speaker: They go, I could make that mistake.
• 55:29
  Speaker: I don't want that to happen to me.
• 55:32
  Speaker: You know?
• 55:33
  Speaker 2: Makes sense.
• 55:33
  Speaker: Uh so I don't want to do it to them because it's like it's almost like self-preservation.
• 55:38
  Speaker: Uh so it would be very helpful if we could say, hey, by the way, you know, we're here really about Allstate or State Farm, right?
• 55:46
  Speaker: They they're all the ones paying right in the check.
• 55:48
  Speaker: Mr.
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: Jones here is just sitting here because he I think we just lost we just lost State Farm and Allstate as a potential sponsor.
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: Sorry about that.
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's okay.
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: I know you were this close.
• 56:00
  Speaker: Uh you know, but that's a long way of saying if an individual with no assets is driving legally in Texas, they only have to have what's called a 3060 automobile liability policy.
• 56:14
  Speaker: So what that means is there's up to 30,000 for any individual, up to 60,000 for any occurrence.
• 56:20
  Speaker: Meaning if there are two people in a car and they're both injured significantly enough, they might pay 60,000 max, because 30 for each person, because no one person can get more than 30.
• 56:30
  Speaker: You know, 30 times two is 60.
• 56:32
  Speaker: Now it gets more complicated if you have three people in a car, right?
• 56:35
  Speaker: Because now no, they can't all get 30 because there's only 60.
• 56:39
  Speaker: So then the insurance company has to figure out how they're going to divide the money between those three people.
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: So these these limitations you're talking about, though, just kind of getting back to the big case, right?
• 56:49
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: If I'm understanding you correctly, those limitations were just not the issue in this case.
• 56:54
  Speaker: That's right.
• 56:55
  Speaker: So I've had many cases in my career, unfortunately, where there was a death or a catastrophic injury.
• 57:01
  Speaker: And the situation I was just describing is our reality.
• 57:05
  Speaker: You have a person, we've had cases where people are uninsured.
• 57:09
  Speaker: And there's just nothing.
• 57:10
  Speaker: There's nothing.
• 57:11
  Speaker: And there's no way to get it.
• 57:13
  Speaker: You know, you can see it on TV, maybe on some program that's largely it's all fiction.
• 57:20
  Speaker: They find some way.
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 57:22
  Speaker: Doesn't exist.
• 57:22
  Speaker: You know, insurance is insurance, and and for ordinary people, that's the only source of recovery.
• 57:29
  Speaker: So we've had cases, yes, where we've had deaths or catastrophic injuries.
• 57:32
  Speaker: We've had to tell our clients that we love dearly that there's nothing to get, unfortunately, or it's only $30,000 for your the loss of your loved one, or the or you know, uh, there's only $50,000 or whatever it is.
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: What about what about if there's a potential third party?
• 57:48
  Speaker 2: Like, so let's just say sure, I get hit by a guy who's uninsured, um, and something really bad happens to me or my family member, god forbid.
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: And now, you know, by all by the appearance of it, it's like, well, you don't have a case, this guy didn't have insurance, and now you're you're up a creek.
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: But there are situations where there are third parties who can be liable, or there can be a third party to bring into the legal process where there is something to recover.
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: Talk to me about that.
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: And and and like, do you guys ever deal with that?
• 58:20
  Speaker: Is that something you're I'm glad you brought that up?
• 58:22
  Speaker: So that kind of ties back into what we talked about earlier about the energy and thoroughness we put into our cases.
• 58:30
  Speaker: I think most law firms would do exactly what you're describing initially.
• 58:34
  Speaker: They would look at it and go, there's not a case here.
• 58:37
  Speaker: You know, like this driver's uninsured.
• 58:40
  Speaker: We've now have the crash report, we've talked to the insurance company, they've sent us a letter saying there's no coverage, and they'll drop the case without putting that extra effort in.
• 58:49
  Speaker: I I would never do that just because I that's just not how I'm wired.
• 58:54
  Speaker: So I'm immediately looking at that in every case, even if there is insurance, I'm looking at that.
• 59:00
  Speaker: You know, so some examples would be there's a bad crash.
• 59:05
  Speaker: I had a case just like this, where uh, you know, a drunk driver hits my client from behind, they only have a $30,000 policy, right?
• 59:14
  Speaker: Well, where are they coming from?
• 59:16
  Speaker: Where did they get the alcohol?
• 59:18
  Speaker: Like why were they overserved?
• 59:20
  Speaker: Is there a bar that potentially has responsibility for that?
• 59:24
  Speaker: Do they have a commercial policy that's a million dollars or more, right?
• 59:28
  Speaker: Uh another situation is someone gets in a bad crash, there's a minimal policy.
• 59:35
  Speaker: Maybe there's a crashworthiness issue with their vehicle.
• 59:38
  Speaker: Maybe the airbags didn't deploy, maybe the crumple zones didn't operate properly.
• 59:43
  Speaker: And if if that had some significant impact on the severity of the injuries that they sustained, there's a potentially a case against.
• 59:53
  Speaker: Sorry for also Xing out other sponsors, Ford, Chevrolet.
• 59:59
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 59:59
  Speaker: You know, who went anyways.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker: I mean, so there are ways to approach cases if you're creative and a hard worker, to potentially, not always, potentially find other sources of of recovery.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker: And that's what that's what we do.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: So it sounds like to me, like if I'm in an accident, um where like there's some ambiguity around the liability or the insurance or whatever, which I would imagine is every accident, especially early on, right?
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: Uh, that like I really want to make sure I'm hiring somebody who's like not gonna treat me like a number, right?
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: Who's gonna sit there and say, all right, we're gonna exhaust this.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: We're gonna exhaust this to see what the value of this case could be, especially when the damages warrant that sort of investigation.
• 1:00:47
  Speaker: Yeah, do you think these firms that have thousands of cases and a hundred or more employees that they've got to pay on the payroll every month and uh millions of dollars in advertising every month?
• 1:01:00
  Speaker: Do you think they have the time to thoroughly investigate a case?
• 1:01:04
  Speaker: I'll leave you to your own conclusion on that.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker: I mean, I know the answer to that.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I mean anybody listening would know the answer, right?
• 1:01:14
  Speaker: I mean, like they're gonna charge the bigger.
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: Certainly not to the the to the degree the law firm that says, hey, we are going to we're gonna be selective on the cases we take and we're gonna take cases.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the cases we do take, we are going to exhaust.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker: Yeah, here's here's here's the fundamental rule at at my law firm.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker: And and if you ask anybody, they'll repeat this because I it's my mantra.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker: I talk about it over and over again.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker: We don't we don't take any case that we can't bring value to.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker: Full stop.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker: So we're not signing up people like a big law firm might because they meet certain minimum criteria and they're just trying to squeeze cases to get a little bit of money for themselves so they can then turn that money into advertising for the next case they get and then just keep rolling it, right?
• 1:02:06
  Speaker: That's that's a lot of firms are built that way.
• 1:02:09
  Speaker: We don't do that.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker: Facts.
• 1:02:11
  Speaker: We don't, we do not do that.
• 1:02:12
  Speaker: We do, and maybe to our own detriment, but I will die on that hill.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker: We do not do that.
• 1:02:17
  Speaker: If somebody calls our law firm and they have a case, we spend time, a lot of time dealing with talking to them, learning the intricacies of their situation.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker: And if we believe that that the the injuries or the damages don't warrant attorney representation, we will tell them you don't need a lawyer.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker: And here's what else we'll do.
• 1:02:39
  Speaker: We'll also spend 30 minutes or more on the phone.
• 1:02:42
  Speaker: I've done this so many times in my career, I can't tell you, painting or drawing a roadmap for them, saying, this is what you should do to get maximum value for your case.
• 1:02:52
  Speaker: But I'm telling you, if you hired me, you'd just be paying me to do what you can already do.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker: And so I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing that I just basically commoditized you and brought you in, ran you through, and took my fee, and then you ended up worse off in the end.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker: And you can't do that.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker: And so what's happened from that, and you I think you are aware of this, is some of the best reviews and referrals we've ever gotten as a firm are from people we never represented.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: You stole my thunder, dude.
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: We never represented 100%, dude.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: And if there's so like, you know, there's a lot of uh there's a lot of things you can say, like we care about our clients, and we fight to the we fight to get the best settlement.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 2: And a lot of people can say that.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you something that has again, I'm somebody I've worked for with hundreds of law firms throughout the country, uh, you know, and we help them on we help our clients on intake, we help them on their Legion, all this other stuff.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you something that always speaks volumes to me.
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: It's when lawyers are willing to spend time on someone who they know can't personally benefit them.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: And I think it's such a good practice.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: I love that you do it for the obvious reasons is hey, people will leave a great review.
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: But it's just um it speaks to what the essence of the of your job and your calling is, which is I have legal knowledge and I have a bar license that I can use to extract justice from my clients.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 2: And even when I can't do that, I'm still gonna show that same commitment to like how they can benefit themselves.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 2: And I've seen you do it, I've listened to some of the calls we've done, and I'm like, hey man, like like uh this is great.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 2: And and we've seen those turn into reviews.
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: I think it's something it speaks a lot about the integrity you have as an attorney because a lot of attorneys will not a lot of attorneys will not do that.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker: To me, it's about respect.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker: So it's about like you have to fundamentally, I have fundamental respect for to me.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker: I think I think there's two schools of thought like respect is earned or respect is lost.
• 1:04:50
  Speaker: I'm a respect is lost person.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker: Like I'm gonna respect you.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 2: Actually, know that as a fact about you.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: You are 100% like that.
• 1:04:58
  Speaker: I'm gonna respect you until you prove that I shouldn't.
• 1:05:01
  Speaker: And so anybody who calls me who has a question, has an issue, I'm gonna show them the same respect that I'd want someone to show me or my kids or anyone that I care about.
• 1:05:12
  Speaker: And that's just fundamental to who I am and the way I'm gonna conduct business.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: Last question, because I know we're running up on time.
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: In this, in this, this, this big outcome that you got, and again, you know, like one of the things I when I when I started this podcast and I thought, like, what's my the world doesn't need another podcast.
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: Like, why do I why start this podcast?
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 2: Is I thought to myself, well, okay, look, this this podcast is not really about it's not about like trying to be a popular podcast, it's about exploring things that are interesting to me.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: And I think there are people who are interested in this, and what's interesting to me is extraordinary outcomes, right?
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: I think we can both agree.
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: And for anyone who's not in this industry, they can I can tell you, as a matter of fact, that getting a $42 million outcome for a client in a personal injury, uh Situation is an extraordinary outcome.
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 2: And I think all the things you talked about, um, about your background, the chip on your shoulder, all of these things, they all contributed to like that, you being able to get that outcome.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: Um, and there's and I think you'd also agree, there's a lot of great trial lawyers out there who get great outcomes all the time for their clients.
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: My question for you is on this particular case, what do you think you did?
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 2: That I wouldn't maybe I wouldn't go as far as say no other lawyer would do, but that was unique that that was unique to Trent Kelly, that made you uniquely equipped for the moment that helped you contribute to that outcome.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker: Yeah.
• 1:06:39
  Speaker: I I think I I've I've been doing a lot of thinking about that, honestly.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker: Um it's obviously a few things, but the thing that comes to mind first is I listen to my clients.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker: I think that's something that lawyers don't do a lot that is unfortunate.
• 1:06:58
  Speaker: But like I really listened to my clients.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker: I listened to what they were going through and how they had been harmed and what this loss meant to them and how it changed their lives.
• 1:07:10
  Speaker: And I stayed in contact with them all the time, talking about how how's this week?
• 1:07:16
  Speaker: How's yesterday?
• 1:07:17
  Speaker: How are you doing today?
• 1:07:18
  Speaker: You know, like what's going on.
• 1:07:19
  Speaker: And so I think the bond that I had with them really um lit a fire under my desire to get this outcome for them, you know, that that I truly was kind of living with them and what they were in the pain that they had, that they were carrying and they still carry.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker: I think that's that's part of it, is that I I made it personal, which is hard for me not to do.
• 1:07:44
  Speaker: Um, but I think the other part of it is I know if I know anything, I know that I don't know everything.
• 1:07:55
  Speaker: And I kept, and with this case, and I and I do believe it had a huge impact on the on the outcome, but I try to do this with every case too, is I never decided on this is how I'm gonna do this.
• 1:08:08
  Speaker: I was like, I'm gonna decide every day how I'm gonna do this based on what evidence do I have today?
• 1:08:14
  Speaker: What has this expert told me?
• 1:08:16
  Speaker: Like it's it's an ever-evolving narrative, I guess.
• 1:08:21
  Speaker: It's an error ever-evolving theme of how do I present this so that the defense attorney and the insurance companies truly understand what their, because this is the only language insurance companies speak, what their risk is in this case.
• 1:08:40
  Speaker: Um, and so it was about using my judgment, I think, more than anything in those situations to say, you know, based on what I've, this new piece of evidence, I think I'm gonna go this direction with this case because I I I think that the best outcome for my clients rests in focusing on something that could be a really bad day for an insurance company at trial.
• 1:09:10
  Speaker: Okay, so I let me give some color to that.
• 1:09:13
  Speaker: Um, you know, we were we looked at this case.
• 1:09:16
  Speaker: There's lots of crash video and stuff that came from body cam from responding officers, which was very helpful.
• 1:09:23
  Speaker: Um, but there were some some question marks that we didn't know.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker: And so part of the process in working this case up was trying to fill in as many blanks as we can because, you know, there's sometimes things you don't know may have a drastic impact on a case.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker: And so we discovered in this case that this particular driver who was driving this company vehicle and had been entrusted with driving it for years had a horrible driving record.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker: And the company, because they didn't follow proper safety practices, didn't even know.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker: Like, you know, their safety officer would tell you they had no idea that he had been ticketed multiple times in the past for excessive speeding, in, you know, in excess of 20% of the speed limit.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker: So this guy's getting ticketed going 80 miles an hour in a in a 55 or whatever it was.
• 1:10:19
  Speaker: You know, it's like these warning signs, you know, that's kind of the theme of the case that I presented is from the defense perspective, you had this opportunity for this not to happen and you disregarded it.
• 1:10:36
  Speaker: You had this opportunity.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker: This there were 50 opportunities that were laid at your feet that an ordinary prudent person, which is this, you know, basically the standard, would have recognized as like this is this is gonna lead to a bad outcome.
• 1:10:51
  Speaker: This something bad's gonna happen to somebody.
• 1:10:53
  Speaker: And they ignored it.
• 1:10:56
  Speaker: And the ultimate result of that was the loss that my clients suffered.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker: And so I just I refused to not make sure that they knew that I was going to find and exploit every opportunity they had to keep my my clients with their dad and and husband for the rest of their lives.
• 1:11:20
  Speaker: And that they basically said, we don't care as much about that as we care about our bottom line or doing things this way because it's easier.
• 1:11:31
  Speaker: And in and then doing that, they they led to this catastrophic outcome for this family that was 100% avoidable had they simply opened their eyes and looked around and said, Oh, this is probably not good.
• 1:11:48
  Speaker: We should probably re-reevaluate this and do this a different way.
• 1:11:52
  Speaker: Um, so I I believe that the fact that we were were so thorough in the way that we approached the case, that we that that we were connected with our clients and that we were listening to them and communicating with them all the time.
• 1:12:07
  Speaker: And that we just used our judgment and our instincts on which trails to follow, because you can't follow all trails at the same time, led to just an amazing result for my clients, not for not for the defendant, but and a result that that we're proud of, that that our clients feel some they feel some sense of justice, even though, like we said, they can't their loved one can't ever be returned to them, but that they feel like that the the outcome is is somewhere in in whatever way possible measurable to the loss.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 2: Great answer.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 2: Well, hey man, I really appreciate you being on the on the podcast.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker: I love thank you for having me.
• 1:12:52
  Speaker: Yeah, it's been great.
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, fantastic.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 2: All right, thanks.
• 1:12:55
  Speaker: Yeah.