The tip comes to me from a friend: Have you seen this?!?  A Savannah, Georgia personal injury attorney bought up two minutes of local airtime during the Super Bowl last night to explain why he’s a personal injury attorney.

And he does so with a flaming sledgehammer. And trading on the shooting death of his brother. And smashing a tombstone. And dissing his past criminal defense clients, describing himself as a “notorious criminal defense attorney” who was “employed” by “cold-hearted villains.”

Oy.

While I am no fan of personal injury ads, having only seen one that was actually done well, I do admire folks who will try something different. But trying something different doesn’t mean pretending you are a super hero and smashing a gravestone, with ridiculous production, as attorney Jamie Casino does in this video, now on YouTube. Go watch it, then come back.

Welcome back.

The most important issue: If he will diss his former criminal defense clients today, and claim to have been in their employ, what will he say about his current clients tomorrow? How do you trust someone who will rip into his prior clients? This isn’t just a question of being fickle in his choice of practice areas — anyone ought to be able to move around for a multitude of reasons — but calling them “cold-hearted villains?”

The fact that he trades on his brother’s death and uses atrocious production values to garner attention (which obviously worked since I’m writing about it and others also will) may go to the good/bad taste of the viewer. I think they are bad taste.

Also, I’m not keen on people that wear sun glasses at night, unless they happen to be the Blues Brothers. And using Avvo Answers to ask people to call him. But I guess those are nits to pick.

But there isn’t really any excuse for trashing your clients, to whom you owe a fiduciary duty and duty to preserve secrets even after representation is done.

If he finds more lucrative retention a few years down the road in another line of work, what will he be saying about today’s personal injury clients?

Addendum: It appears from this article that Jamie Casino’s brother Michael was killed in 2012 and that he then switched over from criminal defense to personal injury law. And that means he likely has little actual trial experience in personal injury. From the article:

Casino goes on to depict events surrounding the real-life slaying of his brother over Labor Day weekend in 2012. Casino’s younger brother, Michael Biancosino, 30 at the time, and Emily Pickels, 21, were shot and killed in Biancosino’s vehicle in the early hours of Sept. 1.

So this guy, who has most of his legal experience in a different field, criminal defense, just spent a boatload of money — two minutes during the Super Bowl — to advertise for clients in his relatively new field. This is from his website:

There is a difference between marketing and lawyering.

Addendum #2 – See Max Kennerly’s take (Jamie Casino and The Super Bowl Ad: Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should):

…I’m dismayed by his negative portrayal of his former field, criminal-defense. In his prior work as a criminal-defense lawyer, did he break ethical rules? Did he conspire with clients to commit crimes? If not, then what’s the problem? What is he ashamed of? The ethical practice of criminal defense?…