#LegalAdviceNeeded 🤷♂️
So here’s the deal – I hired a lawyer for a not-so-serious case six months ago, and the dude totally ghosted on me. Classic move, right? The cherry on top? He didn’t even show up to my court date. Now he’s dodging my calls and refusing to refund me. What should I do?
Have you ever dealt with a lawyer who pulled a disappearing act? Share your story below! 🗣️
PS: Stay tuned for updates on whether I finally get my money back. 😅 #NotCool #LawyerProblems
Not a Lawyer.
If this person is, in fact, a licensed attorney, and you are in the US, you should look for the Bar Association in your state. You can make a fee dispute and report them for this behavior.
If they are NOT a licensed attorney, you can report them to the Bar as well. The Bar may not be quite as immediately able to assist as they are with fee arbitration, but they also really dislike folks passing themselves off as attorneys and might help suing them.
Call the bar
This is probably the one time going to your local bar is a good thing. 😂 But seriously, report this to them and you can work on getting your money back.
Bar complaint. No question. That lawyer will very likely be suspended and required to get counseling.
Please take a few minutes to outline the timeline before reaching out. Note the date hired, get a copy of your contract, payments made, make a note of any correspondence (attempts by you, or lack of communication updates relevant to your case). Any additional document you can pull like call log from your cell phone (with calls to his office highlighted) would be helpful but not necessary. The big one is your court appearance, and his lack of appearance. Anything you can show that documents both that you did have a court date, and if possible that he was aware (contact, text message, notes you made prior to going into seeing him about ‘what to discuss’) Lastly document his agreement to refund, and the date, as well as his failure to comply.
If you can make a brief statement of how he has been unprofessional and provided no useful service with documentation, it should help with pursuing this through the arbitration process. We all have a tendency to get off topic when we don’t have our “game plan” and this may help even when you are calling to make the complaint!
Report it to your state’s bar counsel / grievance commission
Attorney, not your attorney, not advice.
Mistakes can happen, I’ve known good attorneys who didn’t diary a court date properly and missed it. Shouldn’t happen, but it can. That being said, that attorney should be mortified. They should be on the phone with the court getting you a new date if necessary.
If they are refusing a refund and/or not bending over backwards to fix any related issue, you should contact the state bar immediately and file a complaint.
Our state bar association (professional association, not regulatory agency) will do fee arbitration so long as all parties agree, but that may not be necessary, as the state bar regulatory agency may strongly suggest he return the fee.
Good luck!
FL – NAL, but been in a similar situation. Attorney took their fee to perform a relatively routine paperwork sort of legal task. Said it would take 6 months to be completed. A year later, nary a peep. I reach out, nada. I send registered letter, crickets.
I file a complaint with the Florida State Bar. In a matter of weeks, another attorney, presumably representing “my” attorney, wants to talk. They ask me to withdraw the complaint and they’ll refund my money. Nope.
Another few weeks and I get a check delivered by courier for the full amount of the fee and a letter from the State Bar explaining what the result of their investigation was. The attorney was sanctioned and the complaint will remain in their record.
The punchline? By then I had discovered that I could file the necessary paperwork without the services of a legal professional, and did. Before I got my fee back I had already accomplished what I needed on my own.
Let the attorney know nicely that you are taking the fee dispute to the State Bar. I had similar issue and another attorney recommended that option. Attorney was quick to try to settle after that.
Report him to the state bar association and file a claim to get your money back.
Depending on how much it is, you may be able to go to small claims court.
Get a transcript or other court docs from your day in court that will prove he was a no show.
If you lost or suffered harm in your legal case because he failed to do anything or appear, you can also go after him for malpractice….
But 100% report him to your state bar association.
Report to the bar association. Move on with your life. And find a new lawyer.
Id say take him to court, but you tried that the first time🥴