Malpractice Lawyers, Massachusetts

Malpractice Litigation

Any type of professional can commit negligence and the consequences may range from harmless to severe. Any professional that holds himself/herself out as a specialist owes each client a duty to provide the same level of care as a practitioner of ordinary skill in the same area. At Godbout Law, we bring claims on behalf of clients against a wide variety of professionals, from health care professionals, attorneys, engineers and beyond, who have failed to deliver care in accordance with professional norms.

Prosecuting a claim of professional negligence requires a special skill set and experience that the attorneys at Godbout Law possess. In many instances, it will require hiring an expert to testify as to the relevant standard of care in the profession, i.e. what the ordinary practitioner would have done in the same situation. At Godbout Law, we have the ability to utilize expert testimony, critical evidence and knowledge of the law to put maximum pressure on the defendant and, ideally, reach a positive settle before trial. However, if no suitable agreement can be reached, we always stand ready to take any case to trial.

• Currently representing client in a legal malpractice case against former attorneys who advised him that the case he was defending was frivolous and that he was highly likely to prevail. Our client, whose risk of liability was clearly relevant to a lawyer of ordinary skill, missed the opportunity to settle for a reasonable amount and had to pay significantly more to the plaintiff after suffering a worst case scenario loss at trial where the judge called the evidence against him “legion on the record.” We are also pursuing a claim against the same attorneys for egregious overbilling, which our legal expert, a former business litigation judge in Massachusetts, in part called a “disgrace to the profession.” The Court recently denied summary judgment and allowed the case to proceed, stating in its decision that there is an “abundantly sufficient basis” for the legal malpractice claim to proceed to trial.
• Brought a claim of medical malpractice on behalf of a patient whose medical providers left a sponge in his abdomen during surgery, requiring a second surgery to remove it. The hospital settled on the eve of trial for an amount that covered our client’s unnecessary pain and suffering.
• Represented a corporation in a complex legal malpractice claim against the attorney that represented it in a failed attempt to complete an asset purchase out of a corporate bankruptcy. In addition, the defendant attorney had deposited client funds into his own personal bank account instead of a client fund account in direct violation of the Rules of Professional Conduct for Massachusetts attorneys. After engaging in a long, but necessary discovery process, including retaining three different legal malpractice experts, the defendant and his former law firm settled for an amount that compensated our client for all of the converted funds and a substantial portion of the losses due to the failure to advise in the bankruptcy proceeding.
• Represented a medical gas company in a negligent construction case against a contractor and engineer that designed and constructed a loading dock at an improper grade, causing a potential hazard to employees loading and unloading heavy medical gas cylinders. After filing a complaint, we were able to negotiate a settlement for the remediation costs prior to trial.
• Currently representing homeowner in lawsuit against contractor and engineer for faulty design and construction of a septic system at his Nantucket home. The contractor filled the septic with unsuitable sands, and the engineer failed to identify this critical flaw in the final inspection. We have obtained judgment against the contractor, and are presently appealing summary judgment that was awarded in favor of the engineer.

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