A recent Law.com report highlights the ongoing legal battle led by Georgia personal injury attorney R. Shane Lazenby as he seeks to revive a class-action lawsuit against Cambre & Associates. The suit alleges the firm engaged in illegal case running—the practice of soliciting car-wreck victims before their police reports are publicly available.
After a Gwinnett County trial court allowed the case to move forward, the Georgia Court of Appeals reversed that decision, finding that Lazenby lacked legal standing to sue. In response, counsel for Lazenby—including attorneys from Cook Law Group and Mahaffey Pickens Tucker—has petitioned the Supreme Court of Georgia for a writ of certiorari, asking the higher court to review the appellate ruling.
The appellate court’s majority concluded that violations of professional-conduct rules or criminal statutes do not create a civil cause of action unless the law explicitly provides one. They also found that Lazenby’s allegations of financial harm were too indirect to satisfy Georgia’s RICO requirements. However, one judge dissented, arguing that the alleged misuse of accident victims’ data created clear economic injury to competing attorneys.
In the petition now before the Georgia Supreme Court, Lazenby argues that the decision improperly narrows what qualifies as an attorney’s “property right”—particularly the right to compete fairly for potential clients and to be free from unlawful interference. His counsel contends that the alleged conduct deprived Lazenby and similarly situated attorneys of the ability to form relationships with clients who were instead targeted through improper solicitation.
The Supreme Court of Georgia will now decide whether to accept the case for review, a decision that could have significant implications for how attorney misconduct and case-running allegations are addressed under Georgia law.
