Jonathan Mandel

When I first met Attorney Jonathan Mandel, my son had been a resident at Patton State Hospital for the better part of 17 years. Although he had long been stable on medications and had been non-violent for 11 years, they continued to want to hold him, and fought his release on every level. Our fam...ily all felt that it was long past time for him to be a free man. Jonathan agreed to consider representing my son, and invited me to watch him at work in the courtroom. I was impressed that he knew all the judges, the prosecutors, and even the courtroom staff. He was obviously highly experienced in the mental health courts. After meeting my son, Jonathan agreed to take his case. He brought us into every decision, such as whether to have a jury trial and in what venue; and in return we trusted his advice and followed it. He arranged for court psychiatrists to meet with my son and evaluate him, and their testimony was important in obtaining my son's release. His case was heard in the Airport-Marina Courthouse before a jury, and Jonathan's representation was nothing short of masterful. The jury unanimously found in our favor; my son was released a free man; and some of them met with us afterward and told us that Jonathan's closing argument was a large part of swaying them in his favor. I would definitely recommend Jonathan Mandel most highly to anyone who requires criminal representation, and particularly to those whose loved ones need to navigate the mental health courts, because good and experienced attorneys are very hard to find in that area of law.

Mr. Madel was the second attorney that I hired to defend my son in the San Fernando Court system. I was desperately seeking to hear better news and blinded to move forward with Mr. Mandel's words that made me feel he was going to change the outcome of my son's case and I decided to switch to a attor...ney. Mr. Mandel and I spend many hours on phone calls taking about my son case; I email Mr. Mandel a complete package including the prelim hearing and police report to ensure he had all the necessary information to move forward from where the first Attorney had left off and that began our business relationship. Through the process, he would send me emails that were very hopeful, where he stated that he could get my son a disposition. As the time started getting near to the court dates, our conversations began to decreasing and now, (looking back) I see that half of our conversations were spent by Mr. Mandel bad mouthing the Judge, the Co-Defendant's Attorney, and my first Attorney. Mr. Mandel charged me 15k to represent my son and claimed he would get a reasonable plea bargain. At the beginning of this process, I was very naive and inexperienced as to the Court System. I went along with the assumption that he would work on ethics and assist us better than a court appointed Attorney. During the begging of the process Mr. Mandel did convince the Judge to allow him permission to take charge of the case until October 2012 because he wouldn't want to be stuck going to trial. Well, the October court date came and we found out that he hadn't even met with the Prosecutor for the District Attorney! I had been made to believe that he had made many attempts to meet with the Prosecutor but had been turned down every time. That was all a LIE!! It was until that day in court, while he addressed the Judge that he made false statement and notified the Judge that he couldn't precede with the representation of my son's case because I had fired him! I had no idea what he was going to state and I had NOT fired him as he stated!! Complete and FALSE statement was made to the Judge by Mr. Mandel. Without warning, to my son! He told my son, "This case is harder than I thought it was" How can any ethical attorney NOT estimate his knowledge and capacity? This statement only further proves that he took our money without any remorse or consideration, not to say without using ethics. Mr. Mandel, proved with his actions, had no intentions on serving my son and assist us in settling the case; He specifically asked the Judge to allow him to work ONLY through October! He had all intentions of taking our money without actually doing anything for our case. I implore to you, who seek legal counsel, to NOT allow yourselves to be "brain washed" by attor!!! A plubic defender arranged a reasonable plea bargain.