It doesn’t matter if you need help with a legal issue or if you are thinking about seeking a career as an attorney, there tends to be some confusion regarding different types of lawyers. Some people might think that a lawyer can provide legal help in any situation but, while this is technically true, the field of law is so massive that it is nearly impossible for a single lawyer to provide effective legal services in each of the areas of law. Here is a look at some of the different types of lawyers and how they can help you.
Personal Injury
A personal injury attorney, like Steven Schwartzapfel, is a kind of attorney who specializes in things like accidents and injuries. This type of lawyer can help when you are involved in a vehicular accident, when your doctor misdiagnosed your illness, when you might have had a horrible side effect to a drug that your doctor didn’t warn you about, if you happen to be injured by a product that was defective, and more. You can typically spot these attorneys being advertised at bus stops, on park benches, on TV, and more. Cases tried by this type of attorney tend to have large financial settlements and can involve insurance companies. Lawyers of this type work for what is known as a contingency fee. This means that they don’t get paid if you lose.
In other words, the next time that you are injured in a car accident, this is the type of lawyer who can help you with that.
Family Lawyer
When it comes to a family or divorce attorney, you might be able to guess with some accuracy what they do. Family attorneys handle anything that has anything to do with issues within a family. This might include anything from estate planning to family planning and covers things like prenuptial agreements, custody battles, divorce, and any other issue regarding children and marriage. You might find some of these attorneys focusing solely on divorce, but most of them cover the entire area of family law.
Tax Lawyer
Tax attorneys tend to help both individuals and businesses when it comes to compliance with federal and state laws when they file their tax returns. That being said, most of them will go to court in your defense in instances when the IRS audits you and you are facing significant fines or even jail time. Tax attorneys also work within the area of estate planning unless they are employed in the tax departments of large corporations.
Criminal Defense Attorneys
This type of lawyer defends people who have been accused of committing a crime and are being prosecuted by the government. Their goal is to get their clients a lighter sentence or to help them avoid jail time completely. Crimes that are handled by these lawyers can be anything from small offenses like shoplifting to major crimes like murder, assault and battery, drug trafficking, and DUIs. Many attorneys who practice this type of law get a bit of training by working first as a prosecutor at the DAs office either after law school or while they were still attending law school.
Bankruptcy Attorney
A bankruptcy lawyer is one who will assist you in filing for bankruptcy or will work with you through bankruptcy in order to get you out of debt. Bankruptcy lawyers might practice in one of many subsets who represent the debtors and the ones who represent the creditors. Then you have the bankruptcy attorneys who specialize in the different types of bankruptcy. Those specialties tend to be in Chapter 7, Chapter 11, and Chapter 13 bankruptcy. Many of the bankruptcy attorneys also handle a variety of bankruptcy cases. If you need this type of attorney, find one who has specialized in situations like yours.
Now you know just a bit more about some of the different types of lawyers. If you happen to be looking for a lawyer to hire, it is critical that you find one who fits your needs. There are many practice areas that overlap, but each type of law is unique, and you need a lawyer who offers the services that you need. Not doing this can be risky and can actually create more legal issues down the road.