A Houston-area state representative and seven other lawyers were charged Monday in an "ambulance chasing for profit" scheme that revolved around a four-time felon making house calls to victims of car crashes.
Attorney Ron Reynolds, D-Missouri City, and seven other Houston attorneys have been charged with barratry, a third-degree felony in which lawyers unlawfully solicit clients.
Robert Ramirez Valdez, a convicted felon in the Montgomery County jail for assault of a family member, is accused of masterminding a long-term plan that began each day with scouring the Houston Police Department's online database for car crashes from the day before. He was charged while in jail.
Valdez, 47, allegedly had an employee find 20 to 25 accident reports a day then cold call the people who were not at fault. That employee, who is now helping police, set 10 appointments a week for Valdez to make a home visit to persuade them to sign a contract for a lawyer who would pay Valdez.
The search warrants filed in the case do not say how long the alleged scam was in place, but investigators found hundreds of attorney contracts in Valdez's office.Some lawyers were assigned more clients than others. The attorneys did not work together or at the same office.
Directly soliciting clients is illegal, but barratry charges and disbarments for the offense are not common. None of the lawyers who were charged could be reached for comment late Monday.
Valdez also would send them to one of two Houston chiropractic clinics he controls, according to court records.
At the end of the week, Valdez would visit each of the attorneys to pick up an envelope of money, court records show. It is unclear how much money he was making, but on one trip to Reynolds' office the employee saw Valdez pick up an envelope with $1,000.
Valdez has been convicted several times since 1989 for drug possession and was sentenced to two years in prison for assaulting a public servant in 1996, according to Harris County records.
'Cash kickbacks'

"We have an individual who was a four-time convicted felon soliciting clients for those eight attorneys," said Phil Grant, the First Assistant Montgomery County District Attorney. "We believe he would receive cash kickbacks for the referral and a portion of the settlement on the back end."
Although most of the raids took place in Harris County, Valdez is accused of running the organization out of Conroe, which gives that district attorney's office jurisdiction, Grant said.

He said investigators on Monday raided eight law offices and two clinics believed to be connected to the scheme.
If convicted, Reynolds and the other lawyers face 10 years in prison and disbarment.
Attorney offices raided
Reynolds and others faced similar allegations in Harris County last year, but those charges were dismissed after a Harris County investigator who worked on the case was accused of stealing evidence in another case.
Police raided offices belonging to attorneys Ty Gibson, Jerry Gottesman, Clyde Miller, Darren Miller, Jeffrey Nathan, Nhan Nguyen and Nader Rabie, according to court records.
Police also searched Greenspoint Health and Injury and Eastex Health and Injury Center.
Reynolds was not taking calls from reporters Monday and did not release any statement, said an employee at his Austin office.
Vivian King, an attorney for Reynolds, said she is investigating the allegations.