Previous Law Firm Name

• Gorey and Gorey

Law Firm Overview

The Law Offices of Stephen Gorey is either one of the most successful firms representing injured clients in the United States or it is the most successful law firm representing injured clients.

The firm has built its practice taking cases that other lawyers wouldn't take either because they thought that they couldn't be won or that they weren't worth pursuing.

The firm has won those cases and has routinely collected much more on personal injury and medical malpractice settlements and awards than other attorneys valued them at.

Between 1978 and the present time I personally appeared in over 1,500 Social Security Disability hearings. I won approximately 90% at the hearing level and practically the rest on appeal, rehearing or re-application.  Out of these cases, I have only failed on 4 or 5 claims.

Between 1976 and 2009 I have personally handled over 2,000 personal injury claims, including cases of medical malpractice, legal malpractice, swimming pool injuries, product liability, slip and fall, trucking and automobile accidents, dog bites and other types of serious injury and wrongful death. I have only lost 7 cases.

I work on a contingency fee. I don't get paid unless we recover on the claim or case.

I put up the costs for development and court fees. If we win, I get paid back. If I were to lose, my client would not have to repay me for these costs.

A Record of Service to the Injured

Immediately on graduating from law school in 1975, I went into practice with my father in the firm of Gorey and Gorey. Stephen Gorey, Sr., my father, had a very large practice in Worker's Compensation cases but was disabled with Parkinson's disease. I took over the handling of these cases and hearings from day 1. This provided an immediate and in-depth education in proving medical conditions and the legal causation of those conditions.

The State Bar of Arizona at that time did not have a recognized specialization in Worker's Compensation but created one in 1977. I was in the first group of attorneys recognized as a specialist in this field.

Concurrently with this practice I handled the personal injury cases that came in and within the first three years out of law school I achieved a personal injury verdict against McDonald's Restaurant for a patron, which at the time was a record amount for a herniated disk injury. The case and award appeared on local television news and in the local newspaper, which generated more personal injury business. The following year a Phoenix jury awarded another record verdict in one of my cases, which again made the local news.

In my first seven years of personal injury practice I only lost two cases. During that time a Phoenix judge^ remarked that I was "as good an attorney as any that have appeared in this court."

Four years out of law school I was able to get the City of Phoenix's notice requirement, which it had been using to get out of law suits, struck down and ruled unconstitutional by the Arizona Supreme Court (Anarinda Beach v. City of Phoenix).

Also around this time a group of Phoenix attorneys founded the Phoenix Trial Lawyer's Association. J was the only member appointed to the governing board by the other members without a vote of the membership which the by-laws really required, and without my knowledge or request, and was told by the President of the organization: "We felt we couldn't have any real credibility without you being on our board"

My law firm quickly grew to six attorneys.

I began doing pro bono work, as other attorneys were able to take some of my case load. The first organization I assisted was named People United for Self Help (PUSH) and I took on disability cases for low-income claimants (Supplemental Security Income cases) proving medical disability in hearings before Administrative Law Judges assigned to the Social Security Administration. This led to a growing number of clients who also had Social Security Disability claims. The Social Security practice was medicine intensive, involving the proof of the existence and effects on my clients of every conceivable physical and mental condition. We kept track of win rates and I won approximately 90% of these cases (while Legal Aid was winning approximately 49%).

Around this time I also began, doing pro bono work for St. Catherine's in South Phoenix. I was then appointed (without my request) a vice-president of the Phoenix St. Thomas More Society, a large and prominent] organization of Catholic lawyers, and I set up and headed a group of 30 lawyers who took on cases at reduced fees (or for no fees) referred as charity cases by Catholic Social Services.

The Social Security practice grew large enough that my firm began handling claims throughout Arizona (I simultaneously continued with my personal injury, work comp, and pro bono cases). One of the cities in which we handled cases was Yuma, Arizona, where judges from California would hear the Social Security claims. One judge remarked that we should open a practice in San Diego because "No one is preparing cases as well as you are."

In 1981 opened an office in San Diego staffed with a paralegal to interview Social Security claimants.

In 1982 I decided I would rather practice in San Diego than in Phoenix and I sold my practice and moved. Within two years I had the largest Social Security practice west of Cleveland, Ohio. I put on additional attorneys and additional staff and personally handled as many as 50 hearings a month. Again, this was medical intensive. My win rate remained at approximately 90% at hearing and close to all of the rest won on appeal or re-application. I was asked to lecture at a continuing legal education seminar put on by the National Organization of Social Security Claimants' Representatives (NOSSCR). I was also invited to, and did address, a U.S. House of Representatives sub-committee overseeing the Supplemental Security Income program on procedural issues.

In addition to this practice before Administrative Law Judges, I took appeals to the United States District Court and to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. I took approximately 60 such appeals and won wither all or practically all of them. Eventually, the Assistant U.S. Attorney's office began automatically stipulating to remand any appeal which I filed rather than fighting me. I was told that they decided that fighting my motions was just a waste of time.

Around 1995 I was visited by a group of Laotian immigrants from the Hmong community in Fresno, California. They had heard that there was a lawyer in San Diego "who never lost cases" and they asked me to take personal injury cases in the Central Valley. I set up an office in Fresno and rotated lawyers in my San Diego firm to Fresno. We quickly got too large and I offered to make any of the attorneys in the office a partner who would move to Fresno. No one would take this offer so I sold my San Diego practice to one of my associates and moved to Fresno.

Cases began flooding in and eventually I had over 500 open personal injury files and was personally working 76 hours a week at a minimum. The practice covered all areas of personal injury, including medical malpractice and product liability. I did not lose a single medical malpractice or product liability case and more cases began coming in from other areas of California.

During this time I personally handled a case against Ford Motor Company and Budget Rent-a-Car which settled “on the doorsteps" three days before trial. The case was reported on extensively in an interview with a reporter from the Washington Post.

During this time I was also co-counsel in a trial, which resulted in a record verdict for a negligent shooting death by the Los Angeles Sheriffs Department (Camacho v City of Bell). This was a two month trial in a consolidated action of my client's case for his son's death and that of an East L.A. law firm's clients comprised of the wife and children. Following that record verdict the attorneys for the Sheriffs Department offered to settle with all plaintiffs. The East L.A. firm settled for thirty cents on the dollar. I advised my client that there were no grounds for the Sheriffs Department to succeed and I handled the appellate work. We won and my client was paid 100 cents on the dollar, plus the costs of the appeal. I heard that the other firm's clients were not happy when they learned of this result.

I also began receiving referrals in swimming and diving cases from an out-of-State attorney who restricted his practice to this area. The first one referred to me had been "blown" by plaintiffs attorney and I had to take it up on appeal. I won a remand and it was sent back to the Orange County Superior Court. It was dismissed by the court on the motion of defendant The Irvine Company, and I again took it up the Court of Appeals and again won. I eventually got it to trial, which I won against the largest corporation in Orange County and, by reputation, one of the top litigators in Santa Ana. One of The Irvine Company's attorneys said, "On the one hand we're upset that we lost. On the other hand we're happy that we 11 never have to see you again."

The presiding Chief Judge in Santa Clara County called me a "classy lawyer" during the middle of one of my child drowning cases against a swimming pool cover manufacturer (I settled with the manufacturer on the first day of trial and another attorney then proceeded with the trial against the pool builder against my advice. He lost.)

In 1998 I moved to Tucson. Major cases were quickly referred to me, one of the first being a medical malpractice case which had been turned down by a Tucson attorney who specialized in medical malpractice. On the third day of trial the defense asked to settle for what was apparently a record amount in Tucson for that kind of case. After the judge excused the jury one of the jurors approached me with two others aril said that she was going to remember my name in case she ever needed a lawyer herself. That client has since referred her son and her grandson to me for representation.

A young man who heard about this case then came to me with a medical malpractice case against the Copper Queen Hospital (Bisbee, Arizona) because "no attorney will take my case." I hired a leading expert in the field at issue from Duke University and forced a favorable settlement a week before trial.

About this same time I was asked to represent a man who had been rendered quadriplegic when a tire tread separated on a Michelin tire and his vehicle flipped. That case had been turned down other attorneys. I successfully handled that case and the client has since referred other cases to me from his family and friends including a medical malpractice case involving major damages.

In 2005 I was called to a hospital by a woman whose child had a "near-drowning" at a Tucson hotel. I was overloaded with cases and tried to persuade two of the premier personal injury law firms in Tucson to take the matter over. Both law firms declined, one firm writing me an extensive analysis of why the case could not be won. I knew this wasn't right and I took it to trial. The hotel settled with us on the fifth day.

So many cases have flooded in that I have entered into agreements with my clients and with other attorneys to take over their handling and have arranged "Dream Teams" of lawyers and experts.

In over 30 years of practice handling personal injury matters, including a substantial amount of medical malpractice work, I have only been defensed at trial on seven occasions. I have met two defense attorneys who have never lost a trial (I settled a claim for a quadriplegic client against one who practices in Fresno and the other, a Chicago lawyer dropped out of the Budget Rent-a-Car case before it settled) but I have never met a plaintiff's attorney with a better record than mine.

I have never sought professional fame or power and have never sought appointment as a judge.  I have never applied to be recognized as a certified specialist after leaving Arizona in 1982. I maintain my membership in the Arizona Trial Lawyers Association and I am active in providing advice to other lawyers on that association’s Listserve. I am also a member of the trial lawyers' organization in San Diego County (CASD) and Los Angeles County (CAALA).

I carry professional E & O insurance.

Personal Biography:

Born 3/9/48 New York, NY
1954-1982 Phoenix, AZ
1982-1989 San Diego, CA
1989-1998 Fresno, CA
1998-present, Tucson, AZ
Married: 1 child

Areas of Practice

• Personal Injury Including Medical Malpractice 99%
• Social Security Disability (.01%)
• Worker's Compensation (.01%)

Honors and Awards

• Estelline Pinkerton Outstanding Attorney Award, 2009
• Eddie Loza Outstanding Attorney Award, 2009

Classes and Seminars

• Alcoholism as Disability in Social Security Law, NOSCCR, 1987
• On the Job Injuries as Personal Injuries, IAM Local 933, 2006

Pro Bono Activities

• Union Member Legal Project, 2004
• KGUN9 Legal Line, 2010

Representative Clients

• IAM Local #933
• NALC Branch 704

Representative Cases

• Beach v. City of Phoenix, 136 Ariz. 601 (AZ Supreme Ct. 1983)
• Cooper v. Bowen, 815 F2d 557 (9th Circuit Ct. App. 1987)

References

• Better Business Bureau
• Canyon Community Bank

West Practice Categories

Administrative Law, Personal Injury -- Plaintiff, Products Liability Law, Legal Malpractice, Medical Malpractice, Workers' Compensation Law