Tara E Steinnerd

I hired Tara for a child support case and the following is my personal opinion based on my experience: she's disorganized, a poor communicator and rude, unprofessional, does not take accountability for her mistakes and instead blames clients. I'm making this review as anonymously as possible for f...ear of retaliation based on previous threats to remove negative reviews, so I expect a canned response to the effect of "I was never hired by this person so I have no info." There are already 10 negative reviews on here (almost as many negative as positive); why would that many people take the time to write negative reviews about an attorney they never hired? Don't believe the attempts to discredit/invalidate reviews. That alone should tell you about character. If you dig you can find interesting criminal charges in Colorado, that she has been publicly reprimanded by the Virginia Bar, and you can also find she has sued many of her former clients in Virginia. None of that is normal. Unless Tara has miraculously been humbled by the karma that's a long time coming, do yourself a favor and stay FAR away!

I hired Ms. Steinnerd for a child support case and her passive aggressive behavior towards me before, during, and after trial were appalling. It was obvious during court she not only didn't go through all my documents but she didn't even notify me that I would be taking the stand until 10 minutes be...fore I entered the court room. Ironically, she did call me that morning to ask me a question and even then, did not inform me I would be taking the stand that afternoon. What attorney doesn't prepare their client for trial?? In addition, she was incredibly nasty towards me during the trial and treating me like an adolescent when in fact her behavior needed to be checked. While waiting in the lobby for the judge to make the final decision she had the audacity to blame me for the trial's outcome, told me I was argumentative, was unprepared for trial, and did not go through all my documents. The way she treated me was appalling, from this experience I was able to keep a cool head despite her snatching my own cell phone out of my hands when I tried to calmy explain something to her and all the while blaming me for her faults. Her exact words, "You expected me to run the numbers for you didn't you"? Yes, ma'am that would have made a lot of sense instead of looking foolish in the court that day. If you added up the numbers from my ex-husband you could have done the same for me, and that's how I found out you didn't open the attachments provided. Not only did I not want to go to trial, but I consistently told her I did not want the support lowered. My child support was lowered because of documents I clearly told her I could provide her the year prior, and she didn't want, she didn't go through all of my paperwork, and literally growled at me during trial when she found out information about me that she should have known as I provided her all-necessary documentation way before the trial began. Ironically my neighbor also has her as an attorney and indicated she can be incredibly aggressive when things don't go her way. Remember you are the client and you're paying for her services; no one should be made to feel disrespected or blamed for the outcome of a trial they were unprepared for. You pay your attorney to do their job and in no way, shape or form should you be belittled in front of others for THEIR lack of commitment to the job. Respect should go both ways. I would not hire this attorney or recommend her to anyone as she can be incredibly nasty and disregard what you want as a client. I highly suggest you read the reviews prior to hiring her to represent you.

She was my lawyer from 2020-2021 and half the time I didn’t know what she was doing for that much money. Every time I turned around she wanted more money and then if payment wasn’t made she would threaten to withdraw over and over again. She didn’t a good job representing me nor did she even get my c...hild support takin care of. I ended up doing my case alone and winning with out her and getting my support. I wouldn’t hire her nor recommend her to anyone.