Steve Palmer [00:00:01]:

Steve Palmer here again. LawyerTalkPodcast.com Q&A series coming at you today. We'll jump right into it. This question comes from Rob. Don't know where Rob's from, but I think it's probably local. You'll see why I think that. Local meaning Ohio. Rob says, I hired an attorney to help with my legal problem, and I don't think he's on my side.

Steve Palmer [00:00:19]:

And it seems like he's not doing anything at all. Can I fire him and hire you? I get this question a lot. I get calls like this a lot from people. And it gets a really dicey problem for us as attorneys. I'll sort of break this down in a couple of different segments. First, when I get a call from somebody who's represented, ethically speaking, I try not to talk to people who are represented. I'm not permitted to talk to people who are represented. Now, I think there's an exception carved out within the rules when people contact us seeking a consultation.

Steve Palmer [00:00:50]:

But the first thing that crosses my mind is I'm talking to somebody who's already represented by an attorney, and I. And I have to proceed with caution. Now, how do I proceed with caution? The first thing I tell that person is you should talk to your lawyer. Whatever you're about to tell me, whatever you're about to say, say to me about what your lawyer's doing or not doing. Please talk to your lawyer about that and air that out there. And it. I don't want to say I'm surprised, but maybe it's not surprising. But a lot of times people haven't done that.

Steve Palmer [00:01:21]:

So if you've hired an attorney and you don't feel like your attorney's doing what you want him to do or like in this situation, don't think he's representing your interest. I hear that a lot. The first thing you should do is just say, hey, lawyer, what's going on? I don't feel like you're on my side. I don't feel like you're representing my interests and then air this out, so often people haven't had that conversation. And I would say when I tell clients or potential clients who call me with that kind of problem and I tell them to do that, a lot of times they never call back. Because I think what's happened is there's been a breakdown of the communication in the attorney client relationship. And that is almost always the core of attorney client problems is the communication. And I'm not blaming the client for it.

Steve Palmer [00:02:04]:

And most of the time it's the lawyer's fault. Because, look, we're busy. We get tied up. We don't always know what clients want to hear or that the clients need to hear from us. And I try to set ticklers on my calendar just to say, look, just following up with you. Nothing's going on. Still an investigative stage. We'll get back to you as soon as we hear something.

Steve Palmer [00:02:22]:

And I think that often makes all the difference to help ease client concerns. But often when I tell clients, look, call and have this conversation with your lawyer and they haven't done, solves the problem. Now, sometimes, though, I get a different answer. I say, the potential client would say, look, I've had that conversation twice with my lawyer. I've tried to call him 10 times. He won't return my calls. Then I'll say, well, email him. Well, I've done that.

Steve Palmer [00:02:46]:

He won't return my emails. Send him smoke signals. I've done that. He won't return my smoke signals. Go to his office, schedule an appointment, do whatever. He won't get back to me, whatever it is. You know, at that point, you're probably at a breakdown of the attorney client relationship for whatever reason. I'm not saying the lawyer's bad, doing something wrong, maybe so.

Steve Palmer [00:03:03]:

But then what I do is I say, all right, Mr. Client, you need to formally terminate your relationship with this attorney if you intend to hire me or anyone else. That way, you've removed from the problem this notion that you're talking to other lawyers and you're already represented. There are other concerns that need to be addressed. Even then, sometimes I get emails like this or calls like this where people want to hire me or another lawyer, and the case is scheduled next week for trial. Say you're in one of the counties or even in Franklin county here in Columbus, Ohio, or you're in one of the smaller counties. You get on tight timelines in some of those counties, and somebody calls me and says, look, can you take my case? Or let's take the client out of it. Maybe the parents call, I can talk to the parents.

Steve Palmer [00:03:52]:

The parents say, look, my son's represented. The lawyer's not doing anything. Can you take the case? It's set for trial next week. And my answer is probably not, because I am then walking into a buzzsaw. If I take on a case two weeks or a week before trial, or even a month before trial, I think it would be ill fated for me to say, all right, I can probably get that case postponed or continued so I can have time to fit it within my schedule and do the work necessary to prepare for trial. So often I just say, look, I can't do it. Now, if you go to court and have a hearing with your attorney there and the judge there suggesting that you want to change lawyers and ask for a continuance, a lot of times the judge will do that. They'll have a hearing to discuss the breakdown of the relationship and what's going on.

Steve Palmer [00:04:38]:

Judge may say, look, I'm not continuing it. Choose your lawyer or not. Get a new lawyer or not. I'm not continuing it. I had this come up recently in a case here locally, and we were retained to jump on the case. The person had already terminated their other lawyer, and we had, like, four weeks to get a major felony trial together. And I looked at my team and I said, listen, we cannot expect that this judge, this court, will postpone this case for us. And in fact, the judge did not.

Steve Palmer [00:05:05]:

The judge permitted me to enter on the case and wrote on the entry, no continuances. You got to be ready in four weeks. And guess what? We got ready in four weeks. But we went into that with our eyes open. So there's a lot that goes on to getting rid of your current lawyer and hiring a different lawyer. And almost always I tell people, back to the beginning, have that conversation with your current lawyer. Sit down with your current lawyer. You might be surprised what happens.

Steve Palmer [00:05:28]:

But if it is time to change lawyers, don't do it at the last minute because you're putting yourself, you're putting your new potential lawyer, you're putting the whole case in a bag of tricks that may be impossible to reconcile. So, look, you got a question? I hope that answers your question. Rob, if you've got a question and you want us to cover a topic here, go to LawyerTalkPodcast.com, like us, shoot us a comment, do whatever in the socials, off the record, on the air till now.