Jeremy Roebuck of The Monitor in South Texas writes an interesting article about, unlike Friday's blog post, Allstate going on the offensive against abuses in the personal injury system.
In this case, Allstate has brought a fraud lawsuit against a group of Rio Grande Valley chiropractic clinics and their lawyers, claiming that they improperly recruited personal injury victims, suggested patients undergo unnecessary treatments and then persuaded their patients to file personal injury lawsuits against Allstate.
Allstate alleges the clinics, Chiropractic Strategies, has telemarketers that encourage people to visit their clinics for a free evaluation. Once there, Allstate claims they were are diagnosed with injuries they did not have and overtreated for the injuries they did have. The article does not say but I’m assuming they are calling people who have been in auto accidents based on looking at police reports or some other means to find injury victims.
In what certainly is a smart tactic, Allstate also sued the South Texas personal injury lawyers that received the referrals from the chiropractic group, including one easy target that has an extensive history of disciplinary reprimands from the State Bar of Texas and has been convicted of theft and conspiracy to commit barratry - a third-degree felony charge aimed at lawyers who improperly solicit clients.
It is worth nothing nether Texas or local authorities in South Texas have brought fraud charges against this chiropractic group or these lawyers which calls into some question the strength of these claims. But, for once, I’m rooting for Allstate to put these guys out of business if these charges are true. I hope Allstate enjoys its brief time on the other side of the v.
