Are unwanted solicitations annoying? Sure. But should they be criminal? No, said the House Judiciary Committee this morning, as it failed Sen. Denny Altes‘s measure to prevent trial lawyers and chiropractors from using accident reports to solicit business. Actually, the bill would be better described as the bidding of Fort Smith trial lawyer Joey McCutchen, who argued for it futilely for about half an hour.
Originally this was a really bad bill, as it unconstitutionally restricted access to accident reports to all but a few people. The newest version erased that part and made it a crime to use information obtained from an accident report to scrounge up clients. But the committee was still unconvinced that the new version provided an equitable application of the law. Rep. Steve Harrelson summed up this argument in a question to McCutchen: “Have you considered expanding this to all public documents?”