Professional Negligence Lawyer

As public reliance on the services of professionals such as lawyers, accountants, and financial advisors has increased, so have professional negligence lawsuits increased. Successfully representing professional negligence lawsuits requires knowledge and experience.

What is professional negligence?

Professionals are expected to meet specific standards. When they are careless or negligent to the point of causing harm to their clients, a professional negligence lawsuit can help get compensation for those damages. Professional negligence is the failure to provide the knowledge, care or skill of the average professional peer under the same or similar circumstances.

Types of professional negligence

• Accounting malpractice
• Architectural malpractice
• Banker malpractice
• Business management malpractice
• Engineering / surveyor malpractice
• Financial management / financial advisor
• General contractor / builders malpractice
• Information technology malpractice
• Insurance or investment broker / agent malpractice
• Legal / attorney malpractice
• Trustee / custodian malpractice

We provide additional details for some types of cases of professional negligence:

• Medical malpractice lawyer
• Nursing home injury lawyer
• Construction injury lawyer and Workers’ Compensation
• Premises liability injury lawyer
• Product liability injury lawyer
• Wrongful death lawyer

Business Professional Negligence
Losses in business professional negligence cases are usually financial and can be substantial.

Some examples of accounting malpractice include:

• Failure to file proper returns
• Failure to discover employee theft
• Failure to keep appropriate records

Legal Malpractice
Legal malpractice occurs when a lawyer mismanages a case due to negligence or with intent to harm -- and causes damages to a client.

To win most legal malpractice cases, you need to prove:

• That an attorney-client relationship existed,
• There was negligence in providing skillful and competent representation,
• That the attorney’s actions caused a negative outcome, and
• There were financial losses or other damages.

Examples of legal malpractice include:

• Failure to properly document terms of a commercial agreement
• Missed statute of limitations (filed the case too late)
• Not meeting a filing or service deadline
• Not checking for conflicts
• Not applying the law correctly for the situation
• Theft of clients’ money

When there is fraud or theft, you can also report a lawyer to the State Bar or prosecute in criminal court.

Deadline for filing professional negligence claims in Illinois

The deadline for filing most professional negligence claims in court in Illinois is two years from the date when the injured party knew or should have known:

• Of the negligence of the professional and
• That injury resulted because of that negligence.

There are exceptions to this rule.

Professional negligence cases can be difficult to prove

• Sometimes there are several acceptable solutions instead of a single right or wrong solution.
• There may be no documented objective evidence of negligence.
• Some cases rest on knowing what the professional knew at a particular time, which can be challenging to prove.
• Proving professional misconduct may require testimony from an expert in the field.

Hire an experienced professional negligence injury lawyer

Have you suffered damages caused by a legal, financial or building professional? Winning professional negligence lawsuits requires knowledge and experience. Jim enjoys the challenge of winning complex cases. He works hard to research and prepare a compelling argument. Let Jim Ackerman put his knowledge and experience to work to get compensation for your losses. Call Jim at (217) 789-1977.