Here is my honest opinion of Mark's legal services: Mark is a highly educated, informed and well-versed attorney in the field of family law. He knows the rules inside and out and he has a very calm and cool demeanor. He is an avid writer who presents his arguments on paper very clearly and effectively. He represented me in my divorce over the course of 1.5 years and we were eventually able to settle out of court, in order to avoid a long, drawn-out and messy trial. Although the process was very stressful and expensive, I feel the end result was to my benefit in certain respects, given the family law court system is generally a free-for-all.
That being said, there are a few things to watch out for when working with Mark in my personal opinion. First, read your retainer agreement carefully as he is a sole practitioner and for the most part, does all the work himself, including tasks traditionally belonging to a secretary, paralegal or otherwise, and he charges his full rate for those tasks. The bills add up quickly. Additionally, since he lacks support staff to review his work, besides his secretary, it is imperative you review all your documents and motions for accuracy before signing them to be filed with the Court. Any mistakes can quickly catch up to you and cause great damage down the line and in turn, cost you tens of thousands of dollars. After having lost a major pre-trial motion in my case which nearly doubled the amount of temporary support I had to pay, I felt forced to hire another attorney to act as co-counsel in order to verify and double-check all of Mark's work and advice. Without the second attorney acting as a fail-safe, I would not have been comfortable continuing the process with Mark on his own. Given it was a year into the divorce, it would have been very costly to completely replace Mark with a new attorney and get him/her caught up with the entire case. Nevertheless, as I mentioned, be very aware of the legal strategies and documents you are presented and take the time to read through everything thoroughly before signing off on it.
Second, while Mark is extremely knowledgeable when it comes to the law, his in-court demeanor is very relaxed and he is quite soft-spoken, and as a result, he can be seen as too passive at times, especially when opposing counsel is throwing a fit and putting on a show. One would think that when one is in court, the law is what matters, but sometimes the squeaky wheel gets the oil. That being said, eventually the law prevails over the in-court antics of opposing counsel.
Third, in my opinion,if you are a client that pays all your bills on time and that pays your temporary support on time, you will be viewed as a steady source of income for not only your attorney, but the opposing attorney as well. In my experience, it felt like there was an unspoken rule between the attorneys to drag out my case as long as possible given I always paid my bills on time (I had to pay for opposing counsel's fees as well) and they had no trouble collecting their fees. But like I said, that is the feeling I had during a very stressful and financially draining period of time between the start and end of the divorce.
In the end, I learned that a hasty decision can end up costing you tens of thousands of dollars if you do not hire the right attorney and you must make the time to thoroughly participate in your case and review all the work done by your attorney. This may be counter-intuitive given you are paying the attorney to do the job, but in the end, nobody cares about your case or life more than you.
All in all, carefully consider all your options before making a decision on who to hire. read more
