Samantha Secord Testimonial

My name is Samantha Secord, and I live in Papillion-La Vista, Nebraska. Getting a lawyer was never on my mind at the time because the person I was with was a friend. I didn’t want to put that burden on them. But when things started happening and I realized the insurance company wasn’t actually going to cover everything, it was suggested that I reach out to someone for help. That’s when I contacted Justin.

I think my first impression of Justin was that he was just a genuinely good person. He had the ability to care about me as an individual, and that meant a lot to me. One of the biggest things for me was that I didn’t want to feel like just another case file or another client. I wanted to be seen as a person, and I wanted him to understand what I was going through. When I first met him, we sat down and talked, and it was very clear that he was compassionate and truly cared about me as a person.

I think he has a lot of experience handling cases and working with people who have been in situations like mine. And with that experience came everything he was able to provide for me especially being someone I could rely on to handle the things I didn’t know how to handle myself.

The first time I talked to him, it was kind of like, ‘Okay, we’re going to hope for the best, but expect the worst.

As we got further into the process, he let me know that he had found the coverage I needed, and that was a huge relief during everything I was going through. Knowing that he took the time to dig deeper and uncover the umbrella policy that existed — knowing there was additional coverage and that I would have options to take care of myself and access the medical equipment I would need for the rest of my life — meant everything to me.

It was such a relief. It truly felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

In my mind, working with an attorney was going to be a cold experience where I’d have to navigate everything on my own. I really felt like I was going to be alone through the entire process.

But when I met him, I realized very quickly that I was not alone at all. He took over the parts that were causing me the most stress. He basically told me to relax, that they would handle everything and keep me updated whenever there was news.

That lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. It was incredibly comforting to know that I was in caring hands.

On the day of the accident, I was up near Yankton, South Dakota, and Crofton, Nebraska, at Lewis and Clark Lake. We were just enjoying the Fourth of July and having a good time.

At one point, I went out on a UTV to check out some of the houses around the area because they’re so beautiful up there. While we were riding, we took a turn too quickly, and the UTV rolled over on top of me and crushed my leg.

When it first flipped, I had just gotten a Westie puppy she was probably about 12 weeks old at the time and she was with me. I remember throwing her from the UTV because she was sitting on my lap.

So the very first thing I said was, ‘Where’s my dog?’

Then I started doing a quick scan of my body, thinking, ‘Okay, I can move my head. I can move my hands and arms.’ But when I got down to my leg, I realized I couldn’t move it.

That was the moment where I thought, ‘Okay, it’s probably broken. Not a big deal. I can deal with this.’

The first time amputation was actually discussed wasn’t until after I had returned home from South Dakota. I was meeting with a plastic surgeon here in town, and we were going over everything that would be required to try to save my leg.

At that point, it had probably been about a week since I had gotten home, and I was scheduled to have a debridement surgery the next day. During that appointment, I asked my plastic surgeon what he would do if he were in my situation.

He told me that, considering how active I was, he would actually choose to amputate the leg if it were him.

Once he said that, it hit me really hard. I didn’t fully acknowledge it in that exact moment, but within probably the next two hours, I had made the decision to amputate my leg.

At the time, I was pretty depressed, and I was in so much pain that I was taking a lot of medication. Because of that, there wasn’t much room mentally to process what was coming next or what my future would look like — especially things like returning to work and figuring out how life was going to change.

When I first had my accident, I thought I was going to work through it because I needed something to keep my mind occupied. But it turned out I just wasn’t mentally capable of handling all of that at the time.

There really wasn’t much thought about the future in those early days. I wasn’t thinking long term or about what life would look like down the road. I was mostly worried about how much everything was going to cost and what kind of burden it would place on both me and my family. My mom lives with me as well, so there was a lot to consider.

At that point, the mindset was really just, ‘We’re going to get through this, and we’ll figure it out as we go.