Gerald F Gay

If you have a worker’s comp case, please stay away from this lawyer! I had brain injury and have severe post-concussion syndrome including depression. My first lawyer, Mr. James Nicoll was rude and made my condition worse each time I contacted him. It reached to a point that I could no longer bear... it anymore. Finally, I decided to find a new counsel. I called a local law office and a lawyer in that office was nice. The lawyer said he knew Mr. Gay many years and he strongly recommended Mr. Gay to me. He praised Mr. Gay enthusiastically and said Mr. Gay is best lawyer in Baltimore. I was so delighted to hear that and switched to Mr. Gay without second thought. It turned out to be the worst mistake. Since he took over the case, not single time I called him, he was at his office. His secretary always told me to leave a message and would let Mr. Gay call me back. But he rarely did and rarely reply my emails. It seems he is too busy to stay in his office. I was very timid to speak out for fear that I was a difficult person because I already terminated my first lawyer. He has very limited knowledge of worker’s comp. He even thought that the accidental disability retirement would offset worker’s comp, which means he would not get paid because my retirement is more than the award. He basically stopped working on my case after I was award disability retirement in early May until I pointed to him in July that worker’s comp would offset my retirement, which means I would not get any award benefit (of course, this is extremely unfair to injured workers, I have lost 1/3 of my income in the past and will lose 1/3 in the future). Worker’s comp stopped paying one of my medications for my headache after IME in late April. I have to use my own insurance and asked Mr. Gay to contact IWIF. He had never contacted IWIF or my treating doctor regarding this matter. As a matter of fact, he had never contacted my treating doctors regarding my treatment or medications. I have to say he had done absolutely nothing on my case. I do not know what would happen to me if I did not get the retirement. Most likely I would kill myself because I can not go back to work and this lawyer could not do anything for my case. Worker’s comp system is extremely unfair to injured workers because any lawyer signed on would get part of the settlement even though they did absolutely nothing. The worst, you can not directly contact IWIF adjuster and everything has to go though your lawyer. When a lawyer is not responsive, it keeps you waiting and waiting. It increases your anxiety and depression.

I would not hire this lawyer if you have a worker's compensation case. They only way anything got done on my case was if I called them and asked what was going on. They were not responsive to my requests, I don't trust what the secretary tells me, the knowledge level I believe is lacking because they... never seemed to know exactly what to do to expedite the process. It's been almost 3 months and I've seen no compensation check. I called today and they said they'll send a second request to my Doctor, I asked why it took two months to do this, the answer was not satisfactory. Basically, they sent the request because I called, otherwise they'd still be sitting on their hands waiting.