We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Victoria Schall. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Victoria below.
Victoria, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today The first dollar your firm earns is always special. We’d love to hear about how you got your first client that wasn’t a friend or family.
The first client I retained happened after a discussion at a networking event. My background is all within the scope of nursing homes, long term care and elder abuse trial work. After meeting a new colleague and talking to him about how I would handle a nursing home abuse case he had, he stated that he was impressed and would be referring the case to my firm colleague. After speaking with him about the challenges for women in our profession, particularly associates, he then agreed he had made a mistake and would send the case to me. A case that was viewed as a minimal and challenging case, I was able to help the client receive a three quarters of a million dollar settlement. It was a great opportunity to help an aggrieved family, help shine a light on certain challenges in the legal profession, and build a solid future relationship with the referral source.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I started out as a teenager and college student volunteering in nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and retirement communities and was oftentimes placed in a position of community relations, spending time with residents and helping them to and from activities. Despite an engaging appearance, I struggled with staying silent about the issues and challenges for residents that I observed and was asked to leave facilities when I attempted to address those concerns. I went to law school to become an advocate for the elderly and disabled in facilities and worked in public policy for a non-profit, Consumer Voice for Quality Long Term Care, who responsible for implementation of the federal regulations that govern nursing homes. After law school, I was an elder law staff attorney at legal services in Northern Virginia, licensed in Virginia and the District of Columbia, assisting older individuals with legal issues from nursing home invalid discharges, consumer law claims, family law, housing claims, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid application assistance, and elder financial exploitation. From there, I became licensed in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, moving to New Jersey in 2010. I dove head first into becoming a nursing home abuse and neglect trial attorney, litigating, trying, and holding nursing homes, assisted living facilities and group homes accountable across New Jersey and the Philadelphia region since that time. I started my own firm in 2023 and am most proud of my firm’s advocating for accountability against the facilities while focusing on the deprivation of dignity and rights for residents in long-term care facilities. Many residents and their families are unaware of the multitude of resident “human” rights they have when in facilities that seem so commonplace but that also do not leave when they come in the door, seeking medical and nursing care at a time when they are most vulnerable. Shedding light on and seeking accountability for not only the injuries sustained, but also the violations of resident “human” rights is the most rewarding and differentiating part of my firm’s work.
Have you ever had to pivot?
I think it is important for everyone, but young women in particular, to know their true worth, an empowering phrase of the last decade. Yet more importantly, I think we need to know our “financial worth.” It took a long time in my career and in working for others to understand what the dollars and cents of my financial worth and to know that everything I brought to the table was something of financial value. It was an evolving mental pivot and journey over about 16 years of practice. However, once I learned how to calculate the specifics of my financial worth including case results, the ability to generate work and marketing, while having a community presence, I was unable to eradicate the question of whether I could translate my financial worth in working for someone else to working for myself. Taking calculated leaps into becoming a law firm owner was the recent pivot in that journey that I am inordinately proud of, recognizing my potential while continuing to grow myself in both business and law.
Where do you think you get most of your clients from?
I am certified by the Supreme Court of New Jersey as a Civil Trial Attorney who represents residents of nursing homes, assisted living facilities and group homes who have been injured as a result of the systemic failures in the long-term care industry. The best source of new clients comes from other attorneys, local, national, and across the spectrum of areas of practice, and as a certified civil trial attorney, I am able to provide referral fees to attorneys who refer the matter under the New Jersey statute. The secondary source of new clients comes from the community, mainly women between the ages of mid-30’s to late 60’s, as they are typically the designated caregivers, attempting to navigate the challenges of hospitals, subacute and long-term care, while acting as advocates for their loved ones. In addition to speaking for attorneys nationally and locally on all aspects of long-term care litigation from intake to settlement or verdict, I am always excited and available to speak to community groups seeking to learn more about the challenges to dignified care in long-term care facilities, five things you wish you knew before going into a nursing home or assisted living, and what are nursing home resident’s rights and how to be an advocate for care and change.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://schallatlaw.com/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61551714728901
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/schall-at-law-llc/?viewAsMember=true
- Other: RVN TV Advocating for the Aging
Image Credits
Not applicable.