Laura LeAnn Lancaster

On 10/27/2021 I was facing a criminal contempt charge. This was a direct result of following the instruction of Lancaster and St. Louis to file a motion to suspend visitation due to growing concerns regarding the immediate physical safety of my son while in his mother's care. As part of the motio...n to suspend, hundreds of pages of medical records had been subpoenaed and secured from to different mental health providers. This also took many billable hours to read through and organize. When these records were referenced during the hearing, the defendant simply stated that “both providers were lying and embellishing records in order to get paid by Medicaid”. LeAnn’s response was to stare blankly into space and after an awkward silence, simply moved on in her questioning. An accusation of Medicare fraud under oath apparently did not warrant any additional questions of LeAnn. This was detrimental to my case and resulted in the motion being dismissed. To add to this, a contempt charge had been filed in response for me not providing my son for visitation (due to the concerns outlined in the motion). I was quickly found guilty and the judge ordered from the bench that I pay a $500 fine to the defendant along with a 1 year criminal suspended sentence. This is where things became much worse. 1/ I followed LeAnn’s instructions and had a check out to her within days of that judgement. LeAnn did nothing with this for months, until opposing counsel contacted her about it and their next step was going to be to file contempt charges where I would have ended up with a 30 day sentence in jail. 2/ LeAnn’s lack of attention to detail and rushing through her work became quite apparent. The judgement was drawn up by the defense and LeAnn had her opportunity to make edits or “red line” and send back to counsel for the defense. LeAnn overlooked that the draft judgement did not specifically state the 1 year sentence the judge ordered from the bench and was entered without a duration; this meant my criminal suspended sentence went from a judgement of 1 year to the 10+ years remaining until my son is 18. I asked repeatedly for clarification on the judgement and was not provided with an answer. There were at least 7 emails requesting this information, all while remaining polite and professional as I have throughout my representation with this firm. Finally, LeAnn called me (which was very unusual) the afternoon of 4/15. LeAnn attempted to downplay the judgement and even proceeded to advise me that “well it isn’t really criminal…” when it in fact it very much was. As a final “farewell”, LeAnn filed a new motion related to child support and received an objection back from opposing counsel. In hindsight this followed a pattern of Lancaster and St. Louis filing motions that simply went nowhere. After receiving a copy of the objection as the attorney of record representing me, the next day LeAnn emailed me to withdraw from the case entirely citing my “dissatisfaction”. To make matters worse, LeAnn failed to provide me with a copy of this objection, as she is required to do so as the attorney of record at the time of the objection. The truth of the matter is that LeAnn had dug herself a significant hole. Instead of stepping up and taking responsibility, she ran, leaving me to clean up her mess. When you look for legal counsel, look for someone who will be accountable for their work and that will stick with their client. The representation by Lancaster and St. Louis overall was sporadic, sluggish and made themselves necessary based on their own repeated missteps and oversights. If you are a current client, it may be time to take a closer look at what “work” is being completed. As a potential client, I would recommend you look elsewhere for legal representation as there are plenty of quality attorneys in Mecklenburg and Cabarrus County