“When I had the first focus group room here in Conway, I didn't say, ‘Hey, I want this to be a side business,’” Dirk J. Derrick, Esq. says as he reflects on the growth of the Derrick Law Firm’s focus group service. In this conversation with Pearl Carey, on the firm's professional staff, Dirk describes how the service has gradually become popular with lawyers outside of South Carolina, who are leveraging it to find value for their clients just as the Derrick Law Firm does for its clients. As the service grows, Dirk envisions a future where Plaintiff attorneys can have access to the country’s largest database of mock juror insights.
Dirk Derrick (00:00):
Welcome to The Legal Truth, the podcast created to provide you general legal information about South Carolina law, lawyers, and the legal process and hopefully prevent you from being surprised by the unexpected. We will answer many of the questions I've been asked during the past 35 years about South Carolina personal injury claims and workers' compensation claims. We will also discuss existing laws and proposed changes in the law and how they affect you. My name is Dirk Derrick. I'm the founder of the Derrick Law Firm and I'm your host.
Voiceover (00:35):
Please see required ethics disclaimers in show notes.
Pearl Carey (00:42):
Hello everyone and welcome back to The Legal Truth Podcast. I'm Pearl Carey and I'm here with my co-host, Dirk Derrick. And today we're here to discuss the truth about expanding jury research nationwide. So Dirk, tell me a little bit about how our firm expanded jury research.
Dirk Derrick (00:57):
Well, we started doing it in house in 2019, got good value out of learning what juries wanted to see and how to build a case and how they evaluate cases, how to build cases that they wanted to hear at trial, how to take what they showed us, use it for leverage to show the other side to get cases finalized faster, prevent unnecessary litigation, speed up litigation. We know that all of our clients want real value faster. They don't want to go to litigation unless they have to. So it helped us do that. We started getting value of that and we've gone from one courtroom in Conway to six courtrooms across the state. We got a courtroom in Myrtle Beach, Florence, North Charleston, Columbia, and Greenville because it was so valuable to us. I don't think people understand, and I tell the focus group members a lot of times, they're the reason there's lawsuits.
(01:43):
An incident happens. Both sides disagree with what 12 people would do with the facts of that case. That's the argument. A wreck happens, fall happens, an incident happens. Somebody gets hurt and everybody disagrees with what a jury would do with that case. So we have been able to move up the process to show everybody involved what that particular community thinks about that type of incident, those people, those issues, and those damages. So it's helped us, it's increased the value of our cases, it sped up our cases. So as we started doing that, other attorneys in South Carolina learned we were doing it. So they've started hiring us to do their cases and learn the truth about their cases. And we've done that for three or four years now. This past year we started doing it nationwide. Some attorneys from out of the state, out of South Carolina learned what we were doing and started using us and now we've done them in Maryland, Florida, Georgia, Texas, Idaho last week, just across the country.
(02:38):
And so it just kind of organically started. When I had the first focus group room here in Conway, I didn't say, "Hey, I want this to be a side business." But now it's kind of grown to a nationwide service, which has been good for those lawyers and the clients of those lawyers.
Pearl Carey (02:52):
So what's it been like working with other attorneys and their clients?
Dirk Derrick (02:55):
It's been good. Of course, I love getting our clients to the real value as fast as possible. But I also like when an outside attorney who has never done this before comes and works with us the first time, they may have worked with other focus group organizations. There's some people who do focus groups where they just go sit around a table and say, "I got a case about this. What do you think? What should I do?"
(03:13):
And we kind of do it more of a production where people come in, put them in the atmosphere of a courtroom and present both sides pretty heavy towards them and get their opinions. And I like the lawyers first responses when they come in. A lot of them say, "Man, this is drinking water from a fire hose. I can't believe we can find out this information."
(03:29):
So we get a lot of them have done it. We get a lot of repeat business. So it's been good. I like helping them.
Pearl Carey (03:34):
So why is understanding a specific jury in different states so important?
Dirk Derrick (03:38):
Well, people in one state can be different than people in another state. I don't think anybody will have a hard time believing that now if they watch the news or if they have social media, but people in different states have different beliefs. And we, here in South Carolina, it's a little different because we are such a melting pot. We pick a jury in Horry County and 50% are going to be from some other state. So there's also counties in South Carolina and counties in other states that the people aren't moving into. I mean, same people have been there for 50 years or 100 years, the families and stuff and those people believe a certain way and it's important to find out what that particular jurisdiction believes about the people, the facts, the issues, and the damages in a particular case. So these people hire us from across the country. A lot of times these attorneys will present from their offices and wherever. Sometimes they fly into Myrtle Beach or we got one flying into Greenville next week.
Pearl Carey (04:33):
So how does this kind of research impact the overall litigation process?
Dirk Derrick (04:37):
When we do these focus groups, this jury research focus groups, it creates leverage and that leverage can be to one of three different groups of people. If the focus group comes back and says, "Hey, we didn't see A, B, C and D. We really need to see A, B, C and D to give you a value of this case."
(04:54):
That leverage is applied to the lawyer. Go find this evidence if it exists, then come back and evaluate the case again. So the first thing is leveraging to your own lawyer to make sure you've built the case with all the facts that they want to hear. If they say, "We have everything we need and we think the value is X."
(05:10):
You can share that with, you can leverage it with your client to give them information on how to make a decision whether or not they want to settle or go to court. You give it to the insurance company or the defense lawyer. Say, "Here goes the value of the case. Y'all need to pay us. You need to act in good faith and pay us."
(05:23):
That helps get cases settled and the clients being informed to help get cases settled for the real value. If you get both sides knowing the real value, I've told you that the reason there's lawsuits is because both sides disagree with what 12 jurors are going to do with the case. Well, if you can show everybody what they're going to do with the case, you're much more likely to get the case worked out and get it finalized without going through the whole process.
Pearl Carey (05:46):
So how does this expand to aid attorneys nationwide?
Dirk Derrick (05:50):
Lawyers nationwide are mostly dealing with the same insurance company. I mean, we deal with the same insurance companies in South Carolina that they deal with in California. Insurance companies are nationwide. Insurance companies are appraising cases nationwide based on what their beliefs are about the different districts and different counties and different states. Well, if we can show them the truth about the case in California, it may show that they're under evaluating that case. So showing the truth in the different states and the different counties help the people of those counties get real value.
Pearl Carey (06:24):
So looking ahead, what is your vision for expanding jury research services?
Dirk Derrick (06:28):
Well, we've started this month where we're offering monthly plans to lawyers nationwide. They come in and do so many in a 12-month period that's good for their client, because they're getting the truth and they're getting leverage. And the plan is just to go nationwide and help attorneys throughout the country find out the truth and give them leverage and get real value faster. And at the same time, enlarging our database so that it helps our clients, so that our database is larger and hopefully to have the biggest database in the country as far as what the real value of cases are throughout the country.
Pearl Carey (07:01):
The more data, the better. So we've talked about how jury research focus groups can benefit attorneys as well as their clients, but what would the benefit be for somebody to come in and serve on a focus group?
Dirk Derrick (07:10):
That's interesting. Well, first of all, we have found that people love doing this. People are interested in the law and people love trying to figure something out. I think 97% of people who've served would want to serve again, but the biggest benefit to the person who serves, they're helping their community set standards. They're letting lawyers and insurance companies all know, "Here's the standard for this county. Here's how we evaluate this. Here goes how we think as far as the validity of that type of claim."
(07:39):
They are speaking up. We tell them their voice matters. You let everybody know this is how we feel about these kind of conduct, these actions, these issues and these damages to help prevent unnecessary litigation and speed up processes in the future.
Pearl Carey (07:53):
Absolutely. Well, Dirk, thank you so much for joining me today on this episode of Legal Truth Podcast to discuss how jury research focus groups are helpful not only to attorneys, but to their clients and to the overall community. I'm Pearl Carey, and I hope to see you on our next episode of The Legal Truth.
Voiceover (08:14):
Thank you for joining us on The Legal Truth Podcast. If you have questions that you would like answered on a future episode, please send them to thelegaltruth@derricklawfirm.com. If you would like to speak to us directly, call us at 843-248-7486. If you find the podcast valuable, please leave us a five-star review and share The Legal Truth with your neighbor, friend, or family member who is seeking reliable information about a South Carolina personal injury or workers' compensation claim. Dirk J. Derrick of the Derrick Law Firm Injury Lawyers is responsible for the production of this podcast, located at 901 North Main Street, Conway, South Carolina. Derrick Law Firm Injury Lawyers has included the information on this podcast as a service to the general public. Use of this podcast and any related materials does not in any manner constitute an attorney-client relationship between Derrick Law Firm Injury Lawyers and the user.
(09:07):
While the information on this podcast is about legal issues, it is not intended as legal advice and should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a licensed professional attorney in your particular state. Anyone seeking specific legal advice or assistance should retain an attorney. Any prior results mentioned do not guarantee a similar outcome. The content reflects the personal views and opinions of the participants in the podcast and are not intended as endorsements of any views or products. This podcast could contain inaccuracies. The information contained in this podcast does not constitute legal advice and is not guaranteed to be correct, complete, or up-to-date as laws continue to change. In this podcast, you'll hear information about focus groups. Please note that not all of the firm's cases are presented to a focus group. Additionally, when speaking about juries or jurors in relation to a focus group, we are speaking of focus group participants and not actual trial juries or jurors.