Barratry laws were originally built to police personal-injury lawyers

Evidence

To Jacobs, this sounded like evidence that Schlichtmann had actively solicited people to join the lawsuit. Jacobs wondered if a charge of barratry—“the groundless stirring up of lawsuits”—could be made against Schlichtmann. The crime of barratry had an archaic ring and it was rarely invoked nowadays, although early in the century it had been used frequently against personal injury lawyers, then a new breed widely despised by the established bar. All the same, Jacobs thought that Gamache’s own words, as reported by Riley, seemed like an apt description of barratry. — , Harr Jonathan - A Civil Action, 446

Categorization

• DEFINE: Barratry defined in-text as ‘the groundless stirring up of lawsuits,’ with its history of deployment against personal injury lawyers noted.