What We Do
For us, availability is an active verb. We “show up to play.”
Legal services are time consuming and expensive. That’s why we can accept only a small portion of the cases that come our way. However, once we accept your case, we are committed to being available and providing guidance and advocacy at all stages of your legal matter. We take the time to listen to you and to provide you the comfort of confidentiality. Our job is to be on your side.
Advocacy is an attitude, not a skill. There is no substitute.
We advocate for our clients’ rights, dignity, and property using all possible means.
Advocacy is about attitude. The firefighter who dashes into the burning house has it. The kid on the playground who steps in front of a bully twice his size understands it. A teacher who won’t give up on a troubled child exemplifies it.
The fundamental assumption of our adversary system is that your lawyer will be the champion of you and your case. There is no substitute. A judge, by law, cannot file or defend your lawsuit, call a witness for you, or, for that matter, even object to illegal evidence being used against you.
When we take you case, our job becomes to protect your rights by the use of all possible means legally available.
No magic pill or a silver bullet. Just, clear thinking.
We diagnose, evaluate, and analyze our clients’ legal situations with great care.
We don’t know of a magic pill or a silver bullet to solve your legal problems. Instead, we use the next best thing: clear thinking.
Legal rights and protections come only in narrowly defined packages called “causes of action.” The law provides protection or relief only if you are able to fit your claim or defense into one of these packages. That’s where we come in.
Our job is to make sense of complex facts and, when possible, convert them into legal remedies. But, analysis doesn’t end there; it’s an ongoing process that uses common sense to apply law to the real world.
Your empowerment is our bedrock obligation.
Every situation is unique, which is why we provide personalized legal advice to our clients.
The very nature of our mission is to increase rather than decrease your agency (power over your own life).
In our legal system, the client is the “captain of the ship.” Our job is to help you make the very best decisions about your case, and, for that matter, about your life. To do so, we blend analysis of the law with the facts of your case and broader cultural and business customs, norms, and values in the society.
In giving advice, we place your interest above our own, but not above the law. We must be frank, direct, honest in everything we say or recommend to you. As a result, we sometimes give advice that is not pleasant. We sometimes make procedural or tactical decisions without first consulting with you. But, because you are the final decision-maker on all major actions, such as whether to file a lawsuit, accept a settlement, or proceed to trial, we provide our knowledge, experience, and judgment to help you make informed decisions.
HowWe Do It
1. Diagnose
Our process starts with working with our clients to make sense of the complex, vast, and often contradictory facts that underlie any legal problem. We are trained to recognize and diagnose legal issues. Even if in the end we may not take your case, we will do our best to guide you towards the next steps that we think you could take.
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2. Advise
Our evaluation of the client’s legal issues is always followed up with detailed, meticulous, and personalized legal advice. Sometimes, that may be the end of our engagement, but when legal advice on its own is not sufficient to resolve the issue, we are ready to step in on our client’s behalf and negotiate with the opposing party.
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3. Negotiate
When possible, we intervene on our client’s behalf in trying to find a mutually acceptable solution to all parties, using all available means, including law and common sense, to minimize cost, conflict, risk, and uncertainty.
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4. Litigate
The backbone of our process is our readiness to fight to protect and restore our client’s rights when necessary. The possibility of litigation guides all our efforts, and our willingness and commitment to fight on behalf of our client constitutes our greatest strength.
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5. Empower
Our representation of our clients must end at some point, and with a great many of others, due to limitations of time and availability, a formal engagement never starts. However, the ultimate goal of our process is to arm our clients and our community with the necessary information and understanding to guide and empower them in their future.
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WhoWe are
While our specialty lies in business litigation, we are also equipped to offer our clients other effective means of resolving legal disputes.
WhyCivil Trial Law
“Almost all of your bargaining power is built around the fact that you don’t have to settle. If you go to the negotiation party without a lawyer, you are defeating yourself. Perhaps the only words more American than “Remember the Alamo” are “I am going to get a lawyer and sue you.”
In our society these words carry power. If you really want to get a job done in negotiations, you won’t settle for cheap talk about what you are going to do if your [opponent] doesn’t agree. Just hire the lawyer. Don’t say a word about what you are going to do. They’ll get the picture. It’s the difference between shouting “wolf” and taking the wolf and setting it outside the door. It will save you money in the long run, and it may save your case.”
Robin Green
Divorce: When It’s The Only Answer (The Ordinary Mortals Guide, Inc., 2005), p.190.
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1. Experience Matters
Legal advice given by a lawyer who is unfamiliar with courtroom reality is likely to be a very different one from that provided by a lawyer who has actually tried cases similar to the case being discussed.
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2. Go for the Good Negotiator
Likewise, a lawyer negotiating without the ability to litigate the case being negotiated severely disadvantages his or her client.
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3. Negotiations May End in Trial
Always start with the end in mind, and never forget that, at any moment, a trial may become reality.
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