What do the rock musician Sting and socialite Paris Hilton have in common? Besides fame and popularity, both will be guests at an upcoming gathering of trial attorneys, which will take place at the swanky Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas.
As you might have guessed, this has become a big business, with an entire industry growing up around the process. This includes marketing firms that specialize in plaintiff recruitment by using both traditional and digital media platforms. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is recruiting as many people as possible because similar cases will be consolidated for review at the federal level before even a fact of a case is reviewed by an outside party. Think of it as multi-level marketing meets “The People’s Court.”
The mere accusation and number of lawsuits puts enormous pressure on companies to settle, which is often easier than fighting thousands of cases individually — no matter how weak they are. These firms know they don’t have to prove their claims. They just need to create alarm and recruit potential plaintiffs.