Douglas A. Robertson

Had a med mal case with this gentlemen representing me. He seemed reasonably nice at first, but was not always available, and often difficult to get straightforward advice from. As the case resolved, he made some poor decisions which nearly caused my case to go to trial unnecessarily. I asked if I s...hould seek additional counsel - as he was hired by my companies insurance company, and I thought (on informal advice of another lawyer) that there might be an advantage to having representation that was unbiased on my behalf. This was not meant as any sort of judgement on this attorney, just an objective question as to possible strategy, and I was hoping for his honest opinion. Instead of that he got insulted and very rude. However, he did seem to be motivated by the possibility, and revisited the case, and got it resolved in mediation - actually quite easily and for a very low settlement. After that, when I asked him for advice on how to fill out some administrative forms related to the case he at first refused and said that it was not his responsibility any longer. He then did actually send the necessary information, though. I felt badly, so I called the insurance company that hired his firm. They said I was correct and he was indeed responsible for seeing to these matters, beyond the time of the settlement, and whenever an issue should arise related to the case that I needed help with, and that that was what they were paying him for. I emailed him and chatted with him, and tried to find out why he was being rude and irritable, and he just got evasive and lawyerly with me, and said something to the effect of "our relationship seems to have turned bad." At that point I asked the insurance rep if he would take over any communications I need with the law firm, so that I would not have to interact with this man any longer. In the end, a very unpleasant, and almost very costly in terms of reputation and finances, experience, maybe bordering on a low grade form of malpractice - lack of professionalism at the very least. I would not use this gentlemen or his firm again.