Natural Disaster Attorney

Natural disaster cases evolved from my handling of insurance bad faith cases. So I represented and our firm has represented thousands of homeowners that have had storm damage to their houses that the insurance companies wouldn't pay. So, as a result of that, back in the '90s, when Rita hit Beaumont in that area, I went down because I had knowledge. I had some skills in that, and we signed up about 80 homeowners and helped them get the money from their insurance companies so that they could rebuild their homes. That led to working on other hurricanes, Dolly and then Ike. Our firm was on the Plaintiffs Steering Committee for Ike and thousands . . . I think there were 6,000 cases, and there were 11 lawyers. Our firm had a seat at the table that helped settle the class action with the Texas Windstorm Association for $230 million. So those storm cases then led to flooding cases. We represent subdivisions throughout Texas that have been flooded by development. We represented then . . . Our firm represented and were honored to represent 60 or 70 families after the worst wildfire in the history of our state in Bastrop. They went from, in hours, having a sanctuary, their home, and then having literally everything gone in just, you know, literally minutes. So we stepped in. We helped those families fight the utility companies and the largest tree cutting, privately held tree cutting company in the world. We held them accountable. So we formed . . . our 60 cases formed a group of 300 homeowners that we fought some of the biggest insurance companies in the world to get compensation for our clients. That led to the county of Bastrop, the school district of Bastrop hiring our firm to help them do the same thing. And so our firm takes disaster situations and analyzes if those disasters were manmade at all. And if there is a responsibility, who's responsible for the flood, the damage, not paying for the damage or the fire damage. And so that is what our natural disaster practice encompasses, and I'm very proud of that because I also serve as a board member of the Red Cross. And I think that practice area of our firm jives very well with my personal belief that we should all help one another in those types of situations, and not ask questions about race, political affinity, or anything. When people are in need, we need to reach out, and we need to help each other. And so that is an offshoot of our practice that we're proud to have.