Lawyer who writes his own reviews.

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petrossian

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I had a lawyer who was recommended by the NY Bar Referral service (they no longer recommend him). He was awful - unprepared, misinformed me, indifferent to the case outcome, etc. I had to drop him

I noticed there were 5 star reviews for him on Yelp.com. I wrote my own review telling people to avoid him. I ended up getting a nasty e-mail from him (identifying himself) telling me to contact him right away. What he didn't realize was that when he wrote me he also identified himself as being the person who wrote the 5 star reviews. I've since found out he does the same on other sites.

Is this considered unethical? I'm hesitant to report it because the complaint process in NY is not strictly confidential and I'm afraid he might retaliate.
 
Move on. Sure you can complain, but why draw more attention to yourself, especially if you wish to remain anonymous.
 
The conduct is extremely unethical. If you want to avoid the issues with a bar complaint, you can always sign up for yelp using any email you like and write your own review of this unethical attorney and his admission to you (do not embellish at all.) People take reviews on Yelp very seriously.
 
Thank you for your e-mail. I did post on yelp. After he sent me the email through yelp my account was cancelled. (I assume he requested it). Yelp, thankfully, also removed his account. I'm assuming they didn't want a conflict.

My concern with going to the Bar Association about this is that if they reveal I was the one who did it, he would retaliate somehow. That may sound paranoid, but it's life. During the case when I realized how bad he was and that I was in
danger of losing my property, I went to an internet legal referral site to find out other opinions and possibly find someone
else to take the case. I didn't realize it at the time, but he was also a member of the site and the next day I got
an extremely 'angry' phone call for him.

I managed to save my property but everything was left in such a mess that I'm still involved in cleaning things up and it's
costing me a lot of money not to mention the time and aggravation. When
I see the reviews he writes such as 'everyone in the courtroom froze when he spoke', 'the judge actually congratulated him
on his presentation and turned to me to see how lucky I was to have him as a lawyer', or one of my favorites where
the person says he is starting an 'AG fan club', it makes me furious.
 
Your Yelp account was cancelled? Did they tell you why? Did you invest time in it? I hope not.

I can't tell you what to do except to say that, from life experience, you need to pick your battles. Sometimes it's about principal and dignity, others it's about the money you need to be compensated and sometimes it's about both. If you complain to any bar, do you think he won't know who is likely complaining? Not sure how he could retaliate against you but I do understand your concern about the unknown potential for people to resort to irrational, vindictive behavior.

My thought is this - if this attorney committed malpractice and it is causing you significant hardship and costs, that's not a small matter. If you've been able to handle it for the most part with some heartache, you may want to cut your losses and move on.

There are different ways to handle it, including obtaining a monetary settlement with this attorney to assist you with making you whole. That could give you satisfaction. Some attorneys refuse to be reasonable and will challenge you to do something. Then it's your call as to whether you want to pursue - and remember that any defendant could act righteous and "retaliate." I do know that one of my friends regrets not doing something with regard to a egocentric, narcissistic doctor - not for the money but for some sense of satisfaction since seeing his smug advertisements doesn't sit well. This might not be the case with you but you understand where I'm going. This has to be your call and you know best the situation and can use your gut feeling as to what to do.

I haven't seen the reviews but I sure won't tolerate any of them on our site. I take integrity very seriously. I'm glad that you were able to save your
 
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