William H. Lawson

I never represented Doug Martin at any time. He is a prospective new client contact who was unhappy that we didn't take his case and he is trying to harm my reputation as a result. I was first contacted by Doug Martin about 8 months after his 9/2/2016 accident. This is too long. (A good PI lawyer can help more when he/she is contacted soon after an accident - and the contingency fee is the same.) The reason that it was so long was that he had contacted a couple of other attorneys who had turned down him down before he contacted us. I reviewed his auto vs. bike accident. According to the negative review that he posted, I looked at his case more in depth than the other attorneys who were contacted. (That was apparently my mistake.) It was 8 days from his first contact with my office until I declined his case (5/23/17 until 5/31/17). Shortly after Doug Martin first contacted me, a man who declined to identify himself called our office. He said that he was calling to confirm that we were representing Doug Martin because Doug said that he was going to pay him out of the money that he would be getting for pain and suffering. We declined to provide any information. He said that he was calling to see if Doug was BS'ing him. We did not respond. This was odd and it did not help Doug Martin's efforts to have us represent him. The police report (which he took six days to send us) included an independent witness statement blaming the accident on Doug Martin himself. Although Doug Martin insisted that he was not responsible for causing the accident, I declined the case stating among other things: "I am sorry, but I am quite busy at present and I will not be able to look into this matter further for you." The obvious truth is that I simply cannot take the case of every person who contacts me. (We get several new client contacts every week.) I suggested other avenues that he might take to try to find an attorney. Doug thanked me for taking the time to review his case and told me that "I can understand what it looks like is that it's could've my fault". I explained that we have sometimes disproven the contents of a police report, but that we simply did not have enough available time to take on his case. Instead of moving on to another attorney, Doug Martin apparently gave me a bad review on AVVO. I don't know if he was ever able to obtain an attorney for his claims. Doug Martin's review of my office is entirely unfair. We are criticized for being more thorough, more compassionate and more thoughtful in our new case review process than the other attorneys that he contacted. In light of his actual contacts with our office, it is clear that we provided him with an exceptional 5 star quality new client contact process. We spent a great deal of time and effort trying to see if there was a way that we could help him. When we ultimately explained that we didn't have enough time to take on his case and that he should seek other counsel , he went and posted a 2 star review. That is unjust and unfair.