“I did quite a bit of research online. I wanted someone who was familiar with maritime law—in particular the Jones Act. And me and my immediate supervisor, who lives in Pensacola, Florida, we called each other on a nightly basis. We were researching on the internet trying to find somebody that had a strong reputation in maritime law and that’s how we resulted on settling on Arnold & Itkin.”
“I went with someone that I knew had gone against BP in prior cases and head a well-known name. There was more numbers. I just felt a little more secure with it”
“I would have ended up with a much smaller settlement. I knew one guy that I worked with—he ended up going with a family lawyer and settled for a small percentage...”
“I was given an offer and it was very, very low. It was not up to par. There was no guaranteed job after this. It was just cut-loss... I needed something more financially stable”
“I was looking for someone who knew about the offshore work maritime. Luckily, these guys that I got their family was right there in Florin. So we knew of them, you know. So after they come and talked to me, I could see that they knew what was going on. That’s why I chose them. I read about the other lawyers, but I always come back to Jason and Kurt. They seemed like they knew what was going on.”
“Most of the attorneys, they’re around where I’m from. They really aren’t that big. I’m from a small place. And here in Houston they’re real used to dealing with this kind of incident and this type of case. Attorneys in that area are not really used to getting lots of cases like this—being a small area. Kurt and Jason...they know what they’re doing.”
“Jason and Kurt....[they] came to see me. We talked for a little while and got to know them, with their expertise and their knowledge. They really just answered my questions”
“I felt like Kurt Arnold would deal better with transition than someone in my area. I’m from a small town. I felt like I needed a strong firm to back me against them—a strong firm! I went on their site and just reading their past cases, and saw that their record. I could just tell these guys were serious. There wasn’t any, you know, they weren’t fake, you know. It just felt like they were serious business and they could deal with a huge, couple of transitions like BP.”
“They had the experience with different cases that they’ve tried before. They also were familiar with the situation that was happening. More importantly, they were very open to being honest with what was going on—being honest with me of what may transpire during the couple of months. They treated me with respect, absolutely. They took care of me.”
“If I would have went with another law firm, it all depends, possibly I would have settled earlier with a lot less. I think I made the right decision with going with Arnold & Itkin. It’s just overall professionalism—there was a lot of professionalism behind this. They took care of their case and their clients. With someone else, you could be just a number.”
“Arnold & Itkin, that’s the reason why I hired them because they had more maritime law experience in that field. I knew it was going to be, pretty good then. A lot of people talked about them. As I was coming back and forth seeing doctors and coming to the office, I’ve heard a lot of drivers say that you have got about the best lawyers in Houston.”
“To look for maritime attorney, what you want to look for is someone who will be there for you. A stability within themselves and Arnold & Itkin has that.”
“You all were excellent people and I read the books about you all and heard good things about you, and I decided to use you all. The reason I didn’t want to use somebody local is that they just didn’t have a clue.”
“We had seen where they had done some maritime cases and such like that and they had success with it, which that was a concern because maritime industry is a lot different then land cases and such. That did come to play for me—the fact that they knew about the maritime industry, which a lot of the lawyers I had looked up on my own did not have any maritime experience and such. It was good to know the feeling that was expressed from them, the honorableness and all this, but they also had the maritime background, they had actually won cases and such. That was a factor in it as well. Just knowing that they knew the laws and such for maritime.”
