Zachary Westenhoefer

Zachary Westenhoefer

While this review is written by “anonymous,” it contains some facts that allow me to identify exactly who this former client is. This review is written about three years after this client and our law firm parted ways, so maybe her memory of the events has become hazy. This client hired us to handle her adjustment of status case soon after she and her husband married. We met both of them in our office and everything proceeded as normal. A couple months later she came to our office with bruises on her face because she got in a physical fight with her husband’s girlfriend and told us about abuse perpetrated by her husband. We of course suggested filing a VAWA self-petition at that point because it was in her best interest. As I recall, she and her husband did live at a couple different addresses in a short period of time, but that’s not uncommon for many people, and isn’t necessarily a fatal obstacle for immigration. When the VAWA self-petition was denied because of insufficient evidence of the joint residence requirement and good faith marriage requirement, we did indeed suggest to the client that we could file an appeal. But here is where the anonymous reviewer’s memory is hazy: 1. At the start of every adjustment of status case, we tell our clients what sort of documentation we need to gather in order to submit sufficient evidence. Our client and her husband made little to no effort in collecting documentation. 2. When our client came to us with her story of abuse, it became clear that VAWA was her only viable path forward to obtain a green card. We gave her full disclosure about the difficulties of such a case, but she was willing to proceed because she understood it was the only way to stay legally in the US at that point. We have never and will never give guarantees on success in legal matters. In fact, for every case we begin with a client, both parties sign a letter of engagement, and that letter of engagement specifically states that we offer no guarantees. I also read aloud the letter of engagement to each client before they sign, so each client has heard these words from me. 3. We spent many hours working on her case. VAWA cases are always difficult and always take a lot of time to put together. This client’s case was no different in that way. 4. We did what our client hired us to do: we handled her case with all the professionalism and care any client could wish to receive from a law firm. We wanted her to win her case for a number of reasons: we like winning cases, we liked this client, it’s good for business to create and maintain a good reputation, and we like when clients willingly write good reviews about our law firm. We are sorry that she didn’t win her case, but we did everything we could for her, and we know that the loss is not our fault. Now I’m also sorry to see that she makes the completely unfounded claim that she was pushed into an un-winnable case and that we assured her that we would win. She was faced with the choice of filing a difficult VAWA case or go back to her home country, and she chose to file the VAWA case. We helped her to do that to the best of our ability. I don’t see how that could make us “horrible.”