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Categories: About the Champion Firm

11.05.18

Halloween Candy Blind Taste Test

The team at The Champion Firm did a blind taste test of some classic (and not-so-classic) Halloween candies. Some of these proved surprisingly difficult! Enjoy the video, and remember to always check your kids’ Halloween candy before they eat any of it. Discard any candy that’s been opened or tampered with in any way.

Categories: About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Why Choose The Champion Firm?

Why Choose The Champion Firm?

Hi, welcome to The Champion Firm’s website. If you’re here, you may have been involved in a personal injury, and you may have a lot of questions. We have designed this site to provide a variety of different educational materials to help you, to educate you, and to allow you to make an informed decision. If you have any questions, or want a free consultation with an attorney, give us a call and we’ll be happy to help.

When someone signs on with an attorney for a case, they pretty much get a lot of the workload taken off of them. The main focus for them is getting the treatment that they need, make sure that they’re taken care of, and that ultimately we would like for them to get better.

If they don’t offer our clients a fair value, the insurance companies know that we are ready and willing to fight for our clients.

There’s way more that goes into it than just the money. These are people’s lives, these are people’s lives that have been changed, and these are people who deserve insurance companies to treat them like people.

Well I slipped and fell in the store, broke my femur bone.

I lost my son inside of Cherokee County Jail.

I was at a hotel, and I fell. My patella, which is my knee cap, was shattered.

An eighteen-wheeler ran me off the road, and knocked me into the Jersey barrier. I had to have a neck operation, a little graft off of the hip area, to compensate for the bone that they took out and replace.

It did require me to go to the hospital. I wasn’t able to walk.

Cause of this incident, this has stopped me from working right now. If I happened to go get a job, I can’t get one.

Darl, the first time I met him, he came right up to the house and showed me what was going on, and I really like that.

When I met Darl, I was very impressed.

One of the biggest things that I loved about Mr. Champion is his warm embrace of me. He’d never seen me before, he spoke to me only once on the phone prior, but I felt so warm and comfortable, I felt like this is the place I need to be.

Well the whole firm is nice here. Everytime I come here, I’m always treated like I’m one of the lawyers here.

When I come in here, I don’t know, my attorney feels like family to me.

Working with Champ, he wants to meet the client immediately. He gives them a hug, he talks to their kids. I mean, it’s just a very welcoming environment.

A lot of times when they are in auto accidents, a lot of personal injury cases, they’re in very stressful situations. So when I deal with them, I know that I’m helping them get through some tough times.

The more you get involved and the more you know of what their circumstances are, it makes you want to do even more for them, or as much as you can.

Everyone that has assisted me, they have all of them, they have embraced me. I feel like tearing up right now because I’ve never experienced that much warmth from people that have come to my aid, to help me in a situation such as this.

He is a good man, and he’ll take care of you.

I’ve really tried to focus on building the firm with great people who are good at their jobs and know what they’re doing, and who are also good at helping people and dealing with people.

Success in my job is getting a great result for a client who deserves it. Someone who’s been through some sort of trauma with their incident and we’re able to recover for them.

I wasn’t trying to get rich or nothing, I just wanted, and he did, he came through real good. Blessings.

I really wanted something that would be fair to me, fair to Darl, fair to the company where I fell. I didn’t want to take advantage of people, but I realized over time that I was going to have some issues, physical issues, that were going to be lifelong and so I wanted it to be fair all around and I feel like it was.

He is a life-changer for my family.

Categories: About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Who Is Darl Champion?

Who Is Darl Champion?

I grew up in Fayetteville, North Carolina. My mom worked for the civil service at Fort Bragg army base for about thirty-seven years, and my dad was a college professor. He taught at the local college there in Fayetteville. I graduated from high school, I went to public schools, and then went to a small college called Methodist College which is located in Fayetteville. And that’s where my dad teaches and still teaches to this day. Went to law school at Mercer which is in Macon, Georgia. And then after that I did a two-year clerkship with a federal judge in the middle district of Georgia.

Following my clerkship, I moved to Atlanta and I’ve been here ever since. One of the things I like about Atlanta is the variety of things to do, the variety of people, the diversity, there’s something here for everyone. So there’s professional sports, there’s college sports, there’s museums, there’s concerts, there’s a variety of types of restaurants, there’s people from all over the world, people from all over the country here. And so it’s got something for everybody and I really enjoy that about Atlanta, and that was one of the things that kind of reminds me a little bit of the small town I grew up in North Carolina because it was near an army base, so there’s a lot of diversity, there’s a lot of different types of restaurants, and so I really enjoy the mix of that here in Atlanta.

There was never a time in my life where a light bulb went off and I said, “aha! I want to be an attorney.” But it was sort of a natural progression from my interests in terms of what I like to read and what I like to learn, and kind of what my personality was. I’ve always liked rooting for the underdog, I’ve always liked fighting for people, I’ve always liked helping people. And so the law seemed like a natural fit where I could kind of combine my interests and the things that I was interested in from an education perspective as well as to fit my personality and what I liked to do, and what I really really liked to do. And one of the best parts about my job is I get to come to work everyday and help people.

So when people call me, they’ve got a problem and the problem needs to be solved. Whatever type of situation they’re in involving a personal injury, whether it’s medical malpractice or a products liability case, maybe they got injured on somebody’s property, maybe they were injured in a car accident, we’re able to take their case to make sure that they get better not only personally but that they’re able to get a good result on their case. A successful scenario for me is taking a case where it’s difficult, maybe the insurance company or the large corporation, whatever it is, has denied that they’re responsible for the wrongdoing, or maybe they’ve denied that our client is hurt, or their injuries were caused by this incident. Being able to take that case and dig into it, you know, work it up, do a really good job, find witnesses, you know, get the documents, find that smoking gun and show the other side that they need to pay, that they’re responsible, and holding them accountable, that to me is a successful result.

It isn’t always about the money, and it’s hard to measure a success by the money because you could have a case that maybe is worth three million dollars, getting a one million result sounds great, but it’s really undervaluing the case, so you can never look at just the dollar figure and say “hey, that’s a successful result.” You have to really dig in and look at all the facts of the case and say “what was the result on that case and was it good for those facts.” And what we try to do is we don’t want to have a single case here where the result is less than full value, by even a penny, we want to get not only the most that’s available, we want to get more than what would be considered a good result. So we really strive to do that, and a lot of times we do fight longer and harder than a lot of other law firms do, and so that does require patience sometimes by clients to understand that process.

Certainly if our clients just want to take a quick settlement and want to take whatever the other side’s offering, we’ll do that. If that’s what the client wants. But we really like it when the client gives us the opportunity to go the distance and to fight for them and get them a really great result. It’s hard to say that there is really a hard part about the job, because I love every aspect of what we do. I mean, from meeting with clients and interacting with them, to filing lawsuits and reviewing documents, I love doing, I love getting into a case and finding the smoking guns that show the defendant’s responsible, or finding witnesses, talking to witnesses. It’s hard to say that anything is a hard part when I really love every aspect of what we do. And again that’s whether it’s taking the case at the beginning and meeting with the client to whether it’s arguing a case in the appellate court. Everything is just really really enjoyable to me and I love it.

The Plaintiff has the burden of proof, so the Plaintiff has to gather the evidence so that they can prove the case in court, and that can sometimes allow for a lot of creativity. It could be creativity in how you get that evidence, how you track down witnesses, the types of questions you need to ask in depositions, the strategy involved in that. Sometimes it’s creativity in coming up with legal theories. Maybe our client has a case and it looks like it doesn’t fit nicely within a particular type of claim, but we can be creative and try to create new law, that’s one of the things that we’re not afraid to do here. If we feel like there’s an opportunity where the law is not clear but we can create new law on the case, we’ll take that case and fight it all the way to the appellate courts if we have to.

After law school, I spent two years clerking for a federal judge which was one of the best experiences of my life. I got to spend two years watching a lot of trials, watching a lot of hearings, reviewing a lot of briefs and motions that attorneys file, drafting opinions for the judge on those. And that was very enjoyable and I learned a lot from that perspective of how the courts view things and also how juries view things from watching a lot of trials. After that clerkship, I spent a little bit of time on the defense side. I always knew I wanted to be a personal injury attorney and represent people that were hurt, but I thought, “Well I’ll try the defense thing for a little while, maybe get some experience.” And after about the first two days, I recognized that was not for me, I didn’t even think I was going to make it a year. And so about six months into that job, I had a great opportunity come up to work with an experienced personal injury law firm, and I took that opportunity and worked there for a little over four years, where I really learned a lot, had a lot of great opportunities to learn about a variety of different types of cases.

My wife, her name is Julia, she’s a native of Costa Rica, we met in North Carolina when I was in college and got married in 2004. We have one daughter, her name is Elizabeth and she was born in 2012. We have a son that we are expecting this November in 2017.

For fun, there’s a lot of things to do in Atlanta. So having a kid and with one on the way, going to the zoo is great, going to the aquarium, taking her to a variety of different types of activities that she likes. Love watching sports, I have a lot of family from western Pennsylvania so we’re big Steelers fans. So I love watching Steelers games, love going to Steelers games, trying to go to Pittsburgh to see those. Love going to Braves baseball games, love watching college sports, anything really sports related I’m really into.

Categories: About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Meet Darl Champion

My name is Darl Champion, and I am a personal injury attorney. I grew up in Fayetteville, North Carolina. My mother worked as a civil servant at Fort Bragg Army Base for about 37 years, and my dad was a professor at the local college there. I graduated from public high school and went to Methodist College,. which is located in Fayetteville, and where my dad also taught and still teaches to this day. I went to law school in Macon Georgia. After law school I spent two years clerking for a Federal judge which was one of the best experiences of my life. I got to spend two years watching trials, watching hearings, reviewing briefs and motions that attorneys filed, and drafting opinions for the judge. That was very enjoyable and I learned a lot from that perspective of how the courts view things, and also how juries view things, from watching a lot of trials.

After that clerkship, I moved to Atlanta, and I’ve been here ever since. I spent some time on the defense side. I always knew I wanted to be a personal injury attorney and represent people that were hurt, but I wanted to try the defense side to get some experience. After about the first 2 days I recognized that was not for me. I didn’t even think I was going to make it a year. About 6 months into that job I had a great opportunity to come up to work with an experienced personal injury law firm. I worked there for 4 years where I learned about the personal injury process.

There was never a time in my life when a light bulb went off and I said “I want to be an attorney” but it was sort of a natural progression based on my interests, in terms of what I liked to read and what I liked to learn, and where my personality was. I’ve always liked rooting for the underdog. I’ve always liked fighting for people and I’ve always like helping people, and so the law seemed like a natural fit where I could combine my interests with my personality. One of the best parts about my job is that I get to come to work every day and help people. So when people call me, they’ve got a problem, and the problem needs to be solved. What type of case they are experiencing whether is medical malpractice or a product liability case, or maybe they got injury on someone else’s property, we are able to take their case to make sure that they get better not only physically, but also to help them get a good result on their case.

A successful scenario for me is taking a case where it’s difficult and the insurance company has denied that they are responsible for the wrong doing, or maybe they’ve denied that our client is hurt. Being able to take that case, dig into it and find witnesses, and show the other side that they need to pay and that they are responsible. Holding them accountable is a successful result. It isn’t always about the money. It’s hard to measure a success by the money, because you could have a case that’s worth $3 million dollars, and although getting a $1 million settlement sounds great, it is really undervaluing the case, so you can never look at just the dollar figure to measure the success of a case. You have to really dig in and look at all the facts of the case. We don’t want to have a single case here where the result is less than full value by even a penny. We want to get not only the most that is available, we want to get more than what would be considered a good result. So we really strive to do that. We often fight longer, and harder than other law firms. That does require patience from clients to understand that process. Certainly if our clients want to take a quick settlement and take whatever the other side is offering, we’ll do that if that is what the client wants. We really like it when the client gives us the opportunity to go the distance and fight for them to get a great result.

Categories: About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Meet Tamsie Pugh

Meet Tamsie Pugh

My name is Tamsie Pugh and I am the executive assistant here at The Champion Firm. I was born in Sacramento, California. but grew up in Auburn, Alabama, where I also went to school. I’ll aways consider that home even though I’ve been in Atlanta for around 20 years.

Everyday is different. Some days we are doing depositions so people are constantly coming in and out of the office. Some days we meet with new clients, and some days are routine office days when we catch up on paper work. The more you get involved and understand the circumstance of a client, the more it makes me want to do even more for them to get the best result.

For fun I bake, play games, and play with my dogs.

Categories: Personal Injury Process About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Why Should You Hire a Personal Injury Attorney?

Why You Should HIre a Personal Injury Attorney

My name is Darl Champion and I’m a personal injury attorney. People need a personal injury attorney anytime they’ve been hurt to make sure they are being treated fairly and to make sure they get a good result on their case. A lot of times that result includes financial compensation and making sure they are getting the most money possible for their injury. One of the things we like to focus on at The Champion Firm is providing individual service to our clients and we believe that is something that sets us apart from other law firms, especially larger ones where attorneys have hundreds of cases each. We try to keep our case loads more manageable so that each attorney can give the case the individual attention it deserves. We want each of our clients to feel like they are our only client. We also treat our clients the way that we would want to be treated. So if you are a client in a law firm and you a represented by an attorney who has hundreds of clients, it can be hard to get that personal attention, and that’s something we strive for here.

Categories: About the Champion Firm

08.13.18

Meet Janis Stevenson

Meet Janis Stevenson

My name is Janis Stevenson and I am a personal injury paralegal. I was born in Buffalo, New York, where I lived in the suburbs until I was in 7th grade then we moved to God’s country, middle of nowhere, flashing stop light, etc. Went to a small private liberal arts college in Ohio called Hiram College just outside of Cleveland. Then my parents moved to Texas so I went there for a little while. My college roommate was in Georgia so that’s how I ended up here. I did not like Texas. I started working for AIG in the airplane insurance claims department which is where I found that I like litigation, so I went to paralegal school at the National Center. I ended up getting a job right before I mailed out 500 resumes. I then started working as a personal injury paralegal and I’ve been doing that since 1989.

I like to help people navigate litigation and insurance companies who can be very daunting and aggressive. They can also give you false information and take advantage of you. We also help clients by getting them the right medical treatment. Sometimes people just don’t know the right question to ask. At the end of the day, I enjoy meeting our clients and taking their case through litigation to wherever it ends. It’s always great when they are happy with the result, which they usually are. For fun, I have two amazing children that are now 15 and 12 who take up a lot of my time. But if I do have spare time I’m usually making fairy houses and fairy gardens and other similar crafts.