Q: Can a personal injury case in supreme court be heard after 30 yrs? I have a 1,000,000 suite against the city of NY
The attorney I had keep telling me he was trying to settle my case but I believe he did nothing. There was never a update on my case. The said attorney has been suspended in 2020 and has been still acting as my attorney. He told me he was retiring and a friend of his will take over the case and refused to give me my case file stating its a HIPPA violation.
A:
Well first of all, go on the court website and make sure that your case is marked ‘active’ and not ‘disposed’ which would be a problem. If it’s ‘disposed’ it means the case is closed and then someone would have to contact the court to get it re-opened. Unless of course, there was a dismissal or settlement which are generally the reasons a case would be ‘disposed.’
Secondly, you are absolutely entitled to your file and should insist on it.
Finally, you are not obligated to use any particular attorney and once you get the file you can have it reviewed by an attorney of your Choice to then see who you want to use.
Jonathan R. Ratchik agrees with this answer
1 user found this answer helpful
A: As my colleague correctly advised, you have an absolute right to look at your file. You do not need a HIPAA authorization to look at your own medical records. And you can retain any lawyer you wish. You can find many excellent personal injury attorneys using the Find a Lawyer tab on the JUSTIA homepage. If your attorney was in fact suspended in 2020, then he can no longer be your attorney (as doing so would violate the terms of his suspension) and would have to make arrangements with someone else to take over your case. Although you are free to retain a different lawyer, given the age of your case, you will likely have a lot of trouble finding anyone interested in taking it on.
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