Deborah Lynn Zimmerle

Debbie is one of the professional and down to earth lawyers I have ever had the pleasure of working with. She took the time to explain everything to me and never tried to speak over me. She cares about her clients and the well being of the children she represents. I would highly recommend Debbie a...nd her staff to anyone needing assistance.

I hired Deborah Zimmerlee to secure grandparents rights. My daughter had married a man she met on the internet after only 5 months. I confronted my daughter in January 2014 regarding the over $100K of debt he owed, over $40K of back taxes owed the IRS, his having opened credit cards in his parents ...names and could not pay the cards, and excessive purchases he had asked my daughter to borrow money to finance. My daughter and her husband stopped me seeing my grandson who was 11 yrs. old at the time. I first met with Mrs. Zimmerlee in May 2014 and was told I should be able to acquire visitation rights. She said she had to have a retainer of $2500 to start the process I wrote her a check and the check cleared my bank in 2 or 3 days. I called Mrs. Zimmerlee's office many times and she would not return my calls but one time. Finally in early December I sent an email to Mrs. Zimmerlee and asked that she provide me a statement summarizing the charges to me and my balance. I had NEVER RECEIVED ANY INFO AS TO TIME AND COST THAT I HAD BEEN CHARGED. I didn't receive a response. I called her office and spoke to her legal secretary and told her I had asked for a statement with the following information. Date of call or activity, purpose or detail of activity, result of the call, time I was billed for that, and the amount I was billed. I was told by the legal secretary it would take her 3-4 days to provide this report, this was on a Monday and therefore she should have the info NLT Friday. On Thursday I called the legal secretary and was told she didn't have the report for me but, she would have it to me within 2 days. I received the report via email and it did not contain the details I had requested. the only info provided was date, a very poor description, NO info as to the purpose of the calls, NO info as to the result of the call, she did provide time spent, and the charge. Zimmerlee said "letter to David King" (opposing council) but what was the letter about? Not disclosed but charged $45, one time she charged for "left message with opposing council" WHAT ABOUT WHAT WAS THE MESSAGE? charged me $30. The first report in December 2014 no details of why the action and what was the result. The report stated I had a remaining unused balance of $1187.81. The hard copy received via US mail 1/19/2015. I had been charged $1634.19. I sent another email to Mrs. Zimmerlee requesting the details as I had requested as to the billing. NO RESPONSE. I call and leave a message and NO RESPONSE. I send another email and tell her I no longer want her representing me and to return my balance of $1187.81. I received an email saying my deposit of $2500 was non-refundable. I respond via email and tell her she did not disclose that to me at the time she asked for the retainer and I knew attorneys were not exempt from disclosing contract terms and I wasn't given anything in writing or verbally saying NON-REFUNDABLE. On March 2, 2015, I received a letter from Mrs. Zimmerlee telling me I have to sign a document that released her representation of me. BUT, now she says I only have $685.81 unused balance and she will send me a check when she receives my signed document. On April 3rd I receive the check for $685.81. Funny, that no additional work was done but yet she charges me another ~$400. This was the worst attorney and the most unprofessional attorney I had ever used or heard of. I wasted my time and money. I would recommend not using Mrs. Zimmerlee, she does not disclose the details of calls she supposedly makes, in either the purpose or the results from the call. I personally do not think she knew what she was doing.