Opinion ID: 1887901
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Limitation of Time for Unrepresented Clients to Revoke Releases or Settlements

Text: Bergman complains that the Act provides only fourteen days in which an accident victim may void a release executed during the twenty-one day period in which some in-person solicitation is prohibited. D.C.Code § 22-3225.14(d)(1). He implies that the Council created an illusory remedy for an unrepresented accident victim in order to disguise its true agenda of creating an unfair advantage for insurers and their agents. This suggestion is altogether unpersuasive. We agree with counsel for the Council Members who, relying on Hornstein, 560 A.2d at 533, argue that to lend any credence to the charge that the Council engaged in Machiavellian tactics would turn on its head the mandate that the court presume the validity of the challenged law [19] and the good faith of the legislature in enacting it. The reality is less sinister than Bergman suggests. Members of the Council, like the Supreme Court in Ohralik and Went For It, were aware that even a narrowly drawn proscription against in-person solicitation could lead some accident victims to enter into settlements, or to execute releases from liability, at a time when they were not represented by counsel and did not know their rights. It was for that reason that the Council included in the statute a provision permitting an unrepresented client to rescind such an agreement within fourteen days after executing it. Indeed, in conformity with an amendment proposed by Council Member Kwame Brown, the period was increased from seven business days, as originally proposed, to fourteen calendar days, because [t]he number of days after signing a release without the benefit of legal counsel in which an injured party may exercise the voidability clause should be longer to ensure that the injured party has ample time to exercise that option. In any event, the Act permits direct-mail solicitation by practitioners at any time, and it allows in-person solicitation by practitioners with whom the prospective client has a prior relationship. There is thus no period during which a practitioner is prevented from communicating with the victim of an accident victim. The victim's right to legal representation, if he or she ultimately chooses to employ counsel, is further protected by the requirement that any release contain a notice of the claimant's right to rescind conspicuously and separately stated on the release. D.C.Code § 22-3225.14(d)(2). This is not the stuff of which a perverse hidden agenda to chill victims' exercise of their rights is made. The Council could have, and perhaps should have, given unrepresented victims the full twenty-one days to rescind uncounseled settlements or releases, but this is a question of legislative policy and the Council's decision should not be second-guessed by the judiciary. In sum, we conclude that the Act is a reasonable exercise of the Council's police power, that it does not constitute viewpoint discrimination, and that it is consistent with the First Amendment.