Christopher Russell Rau

Very pessimistic and arrogant throughout my representation. Don’t think he expected a positive outcome and probably didn’t even believe his client. After examining some witnesses and halfway through the hearing he tells me how surprised he is that I was telling him the truth. However, he didn’t co...me with the preparation to get the outcome for a positive outcome.

I got the referral to consult this lawyer from Virginia Lawyer Referral Service. During my paid 30-minutes session, I was interrupted by his 3 unrelated phone calls. He answered each of those phone calls and talked for more than 5 minutes on each call. Then when he finally let me finish my story, h...e did not answer my questions directly, and instead he started telling me some of his other clients stories, which did not sound related to my concern at all. I was watching the clock and saw the 30 minutes was almost over, he still wouldn't stop his story and answer my questions. When I finally stood up and leave at about 40 minutes point. He said it's 15 minutes over the appointment time, and his rate was $200/hr, and asked me for $50. When I tried to express my concern about his time spent on the phone calls, he wouldn't listen and insisted that he needed to have the $50. So I had to give him $50 and left, but I was very disappointed by his unprofessional practice behavior as a licensed lawyer. 1. He was not supposed to discuss other clients' cases in front of a new client simply for his clients privacy. 2. He was not supposed to share his client's stories with others. 3. He should not have used my paid time to talk to other clients, if he had to answer those phone calls, he should have watched the time he used on each call and should not have counted as my time. 4. He should not have asked me to pay $50 for exceeding 10 minutes. (total time I stayed in his office was 40 minutes including his phone call time with other clients.)