The Law Firm
Our Portland personal injury law firm handles Oregon & Washington personal injury cases. We are an experienced Oregon & Washington personal accident injury law firm with substantial trial experience. Our primary lawyer, Aaron DeShaw, is one of less than 100 Oregon lawyers and judges selected for the American Board of Trial Advocates.
We have settled, mediated, arbitrated and tried many personal injury trials. We handle injuries from: auto accidents, truck accidents, traumatic brain injuries, amputation cases, DUI DUII DWI accidents (often with dram shop lawsuits against the bars who overserved the drunk driver), wrongful death, and product liability cases. Other serious accidents and injuries include natural gas explosions, bridge collapse cases, garbage truck accidents, log truck accidents, bike accidents, pedestrian accidents and insurance bad faith. We are best known for handling complex injury cases involving traumatic brain injury and other associated injuries. We also have a history of handling one of the largest insurance class action / insurance bad faith cases in U.S. history (Hensley v. CSC, et al.)
We practice personal injury or “tort” law. This area of law protects your rights provides you compensation should someone’s recklessness, carelessness, or intentional misconduct injures or damage you or your family.
Call us for a free personal injury lawyer consultation.
Oregon & Washington personal injury law firm
The Oregon personal injury attorneys at DeShaw Trial Lawyers focus almost exclusively in the field of serious accidents and injuries.
Much of the time we serve as Portland auto accident lawyers, but handle cases from Portland to Bend, Vancouver to Seattle, and outside the Pacific Northwest. We are best known for handling traumatic brain injury cases, catastrophic injuries (often with multiple fractures), amputation lawsuits, and natural gas explosion cases where people sustain traumatic brain injuries, inner ear injuries and PTSD.
We are hired by other lawyers to settle or try their largest and most medically complex personal injury cases. We are often retained by lawyers from other states to handle their serious personal injury cases occurring in Oregon, and as co-counsel in complex litigation in Oregon courts.
Client Reviews
Our Portland personal injury law firm has a perfect 5.0 Star Google rating and a perfect 10/10 Avvo score.
Our clients are seeking guidance and counsel at a time when their life has been permanently changed. Our goal is different than many other law firms - we prioritize our clients getting back to health rather than prioritizing the money. Once we know the client has healed to the best of their abilities, using the best doctors and health care providers available in their local area, we consider the value of the client's injury, including the permanent consequences on their personal life and the financial losses caused by the injury.
The difference in our approach starts from the first intake meeting. While you might get a few minutes with a legal assistant in another state via Zoom at some large national personal injury law firms, the intake meeting at our Oregon law firm lasts 45 minutes to several hours with a lawyer, usually in person. In the most severe injury cases where transportation is problematic, we will even come to you, or break down our intake into more than one session. We handle complex injury cases and we want to understand how the injury has impacted you.
Rather than settling every case for whatever small amount of money the insurer will offer, we plan on every case going to trial so that if a lowball offer is made, we are prepared to take your case to a jury. At our firm a lawyer, not a legal assistant or paralegal, writes all demand letters, lawsuits, motions, motion responses, and trial briefs. Preparation for depositions and trial are all done by a lawyer, not a generic video or legal staff member.
While trials are now very rare, our lawyers are experienced in binding arbitration, bench trials, and jury trials. Dr. DeShaw's induction into the American Board of Trial Advocates requires the lawyer have extensive trial experience, was nominated and supported in their application by a senior litigator, and that they were approved by a vote of a national board of ABOTA.
Our litigation history substantiates our commitment to litigation on behalf of our clients. While the Insurance Research Council, the US Department of Justice Bureau of Statistics, and Oregon judicial research demonstrates that less than 1% of personal injury cases are filed as lawsuits, approximately 60-70% of our cases go to litigation. This means our firm does 60-70 times more litigation for our clients than the average personal injury law firm. The message to insurers is clear - if a reasonable settlement offer isn't made, we will go to trial. And if we prove the the offer was insufficient, then we will bring an insurance bad faith claim directly against the insurer after that.
Our lawyer's unique experience in health care, law, insurance claim practices, demand letters, and litigation strategy provide a powerful combination for injured people seeking an Oregon or Washington personal injury law firm.
While this creates more work for our lawyers, it is also what results in us receiving consistent 5 star reviews from our clients. It is a stark difference from hiring an out of state, mass volume settlement mill law firm.
If you have a high value injury case that will impact the rest of your life, you deserve 5 star quality legal services.
Our Portland personal injury law firm has a perfect 5.0 Star Google rating and a perfect 10/10 Avvo score.
Case Outcomes Matter
The entire reason why injured people hire a personal injury lawyer is to ensure they get a full and fair outcome in their personal injury claim. So, while our #1 goal is helping our clients improve their health and decrease the impact of their injuries, case outcomes matter more than anything else when hiring a lawyer.
Our Portland personal injury law firm is one of few law firms in the United States to have obtained over $1 billion in case outcomes individually and in our work with other law firms on behalf of our clients.
Our law firm also has the largest personal injury compensatory damage verdict in Oregon history ($77,523,748.93) as well as record jury verdicts in Multnomah County and other Oregon counties.
One of few law firms in the US to have obtained over $1 billion in case outcomes
Professional Reputation Matters
Insurance companies track attorney outcomes through the law firm's federal tax ID number. In addition, there are now third party AI technology companies, such as Premonition, that track law firm outcomes and then feed that data into the insurance claim software that determines settlement offers. (This also helps insurance companies hire the most effective defense lawyer for the judge in the case and the plaintiff lawyer.) The settlement offer is higher for a lawyer or law firm with a strong reputation within the legal profession, and a history of high case outcomes and trial verdicts.
What is our professional reputation?
Our lead trial lawyer, Aaron DeShaw, has received a lifetime achievement award in law - the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association Presidential Award. DeShaw has been selected for multiple consecutive years for Super Lawyers, an annual list featuring the Top 5% of Oregon lawyers, as nominated and voted on by lawyers and judges. DeShaw has also been selected by Forbes as a Top 10 personal injury lawyers in Portland Oregon. Aaron DeShaw is one of less than 100 Oregon lawyers and judges inducted into the American Board of Trial Advocates.
DeShaw's depth as a retired Doctor of Chiropractic, published author on insurance claim systems, and counsel on large insurance class action cases, provides a powerful combination of talents for our clients.
Our access to cutting edge legal methods is also important. DeShaw is considered one of the most influential plaintiff lawyers in the United States through his legal publishing company Trial Guides; "Trial Guides and its founder, Aaron DeShaw, have armed, honed, and inspired more plaintiff's attorneys than anything else this century." Leading trial consultant David Ball Ph.D., author of the landmark legal books David Ball on Damages, Reptile, and Damages Evolving. Our Oregon lawyers use a variety of trial methods from both published and out of print books and educational videos to provide high quality legal services to our clients.
Insurers know we are selective in the cases our law firm accepts, limiting our cases to highly credible clients who are seriously injured. Similarly, we hold ourselves to a high level of credibility and personal integrity in our interaction with clients, judges, jurors, and other professionals. We believe that professional reputation and integrity are very important as people, and as lawyers.
This professional reputation impacts our client's case values. Insurers know who we are, and our case selection, professional reputation, and case outcomes impact how your personal injury case will be viewed when it comes time to make a settlement offer.
Our lead trial lawyer, Aaron DeShaw, has received a lifetime achievement award in law - the Oregon Trial Lawyers Association Presidential Award, and multiple other legal awards.
