I first reached out to Mr. Long in the midst of a difficult legal situation. Clueless, I began searching online and leaving messages with whoever I could find online, and I did not expect really anyone to get in touch with me over the weekend; I am not good at waiting, and wanted to get the ball roll...ing as soon as possible. I still had in the back of my mind the rule that you must exhaust 70% of your options before making a choice, and as the responses began to come in later that Saturday, I wanted to make an "educated" decision, although I was lost. There was one other candidate who almost had me sold, although he was, in the end, even more expensive than Mr. Long, but again, I went for that sweet spot in being more affordable, down to earth (not full of themselves), but really well-connected and incredibly knowledgeable. I do not know if I truly exhausted 70% of my options, but I came close, turning down a few others in the end for Mr. Long. He said that communication lines were open and I was free to text him, only that he may not respond immediately, but I was free to text him as much as I felt was necessary, a really reassuring aspect.
Since I wanted to get the proceedings out of the way, he offered that I essentially hire him on the spot at my hearing the following Monday, at which time I would be able to pay half of the fee (somewhat of a payment plan). There he was, bright and early that Monday, with his available dates in hand. The trial was set for a month and a half from then, and this was sure to be a long wait for me, even though the time would fly by somehow.
I probably texted him ten to fifteen times in the span of this case, and each time I received communication back in a day or so, sometimes almost instantly. The same is true with email, and even after the trial, he still followed up with the questions I had in a timely manner. I had two meetings with Mr. Long, both of which were presumably after hours, another plus of working with him. In the first meeting, I came to him with questions about what I could do to improve my case, and he gave me a goal of community service hours, among other things. Granted, this was not something that he necessarily did, but he knew all the things to do, adding a suggestion I did not think of. In the second meeting, only a few days before the case, he shared how he had been reading up on the code, again reassuring, for he really was working with me on resolving this case in the best way possible for me.
I do not know much about the legal process, and so I was just sitting there the day of my trial, trying to take everything in. All I knew is that Mr. Long was present up front, conversing with people who seemed to be influential in the process, and overall he looked ready for business. Before I was called, a couple times the name of the security guard who arrested me was called, and I had confirmed with Mr. Long that he was not present. When my name finally was called, we went up to the front, and almost immediately my case was dismissed, essentially because there was not enough evidence to prosecute me. I do not know what kind of magic Mr Long worked, or what kinds of tricks he had up his sleeve going into the courtroom that morning, but the outcome was incredible. I went from having a class 5 felony and a class 1 misdemeanor pending on me to having nothing but the record of my arrest on file.
After the trial, again keeping in mind that I am not a fan of waiting, and that had been the longest I had been expecting something in quite some time, if ever, I could not help but give Mr. Long a hug (to which he remarked that he had a strict no-hugging policy). My mom felt the same way, and in the end we were all incredibly satisfied with his service. Do not be fooled by his focus on traffic in his website, he just gets more traffic cases; he knows the law in and out in any area.