Judge: Comp Attorney Should Be Suspended for Coaching Witness Via Text Messages

A Florida workers' compensation defense attorney should be suspended from practice for 30 days after he was found to have coached a claims adjuster through text messages during a telephone deposition, a judge has recommended. Derek James, a partner in the firm Jones Hurley & Hand, with offices in Orlando, Miami and Tampa, became the subject of a Florida Bar complaint this year after he accidentally sent a text to the claimant's attorney in the middle of the teleconference deposition. An investigation produced James' other texts that day, which showed he had been tel...